Recent progress in bulk glassy, nanoquasicrystalline and nanocrystalline alloys

This paper deals with recent progress in stabilized supercooled liquids (SLs) and the resulting bulk glassy, nanoquasicrystalline and nanocrystalline alloys which were mainly conducted by Sendai group in Japan. In this review, the following contents are focused on: bulk metallic glassy alloy systems, empirical rules for the achievement of high glass-forming ability (GFA), local atomic configurations, computational analyses, thermodynamic analysis, mechanical properties, soft magnetic properties, micro-forming ability, application, science and engineering importance and future trend of bulk glassy alloys including SL. As demonstrated in this review, the high stabilization of metallic SLs has already opened up new basic science and engineering application fields and its importance is strongly expected to increase more and more hereafter. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.