A lightweight shape-memory magnesium alloy
Lightweight shapeshifting alloys
Shape memory alloys (SMAs) spring back into shape after they are deformed, a useful property for a variety of applications. Transition metal alloys, which are robust but dense, dominate the SMA landscape. Ogawa et al. report a new type of lightweight SMA made from magnesium and scandium, which has comparable properties to known SMAs but at significantly lower density. Although this magnesium-scandium alloy is limited to low-temperature applications, development of a new lightweight class of SMAs could be on the horizon.
Science, this issue p. 368
Abstract
Shape-memory alloys (SMAs), which display shape recovery upon heating, as well as superelasticity, offer many technological advantages in various applications. Those distinctive behaviors have been observed in many polycrystalline alloy systems such as nickel titantium (TiNi)–, copper-, iron-, nickel-, cobalt-, and Ti-based alloys but not in lightweight alloys such as magnesium (Mg) and aluminum alloys. Here we present a Mg SMA showing superelasticity of 4.4% at –150°C and shape recovery upon heating. The shape-memory properties are caused by reversible martensitic transformation. This Mg alloy includes lightweight scandium, and its density is about 2 grams per cubic centimeter, which is one-third less than that of practical TiNi SMAs. This finding raises the potential for development and application of lightweight SMAs across a number of industries.
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Published In
Science
Volume 353 | Issue 6297
22 July 2016
22 July 2016
Copyright
Copyright © 2016, American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Submission history
Received: 9 March 2016
Accepted: 28 June 2016
Published in print: 22 July 2016
Acknowledgments
We thank N. Ueshima and K. Oikawa (Tohoku University, Japan) for help with the tensile testing experiment; X. Xu, T. Omori, and R. Kainuma (Tohoku University, Japan) for help with the XRD and Physical Property Measurement System experiments; K. Kobayashi and T. Miyazaki (Tohoku University, Japan) for help with TEM measurements; and K. Yoshimi and K. Ishida (Tohoku University, Japan) for fruitful discussions. This work was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science KAKENHI, Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (A), grant no. 15H05549, and Tohoku University Division for International Advanced Research and Education. The present authors are inventors on Japanese patent application no. 2015-201830, applied for by Tohoku University. The data are available from the corresponding authors upon request.
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