Mechanically Alloyed High-entropy Alloys Compacted by Spark Plasma Sintering

Since 2004, materials research got a new impulse that completely changed the formerly chosen approach towards alloy design. Up to these days, the alloys were designed as systems with a main constituent that was further intentionally alloyed with small amounts of elements enhancing the alloy properties. The clearly distinguishable main element was, accordingly to the newly announced concept, completely removed due to the formation of equiatomic CoCrFeNiMn alloy with a single-phase FCC solid solution [1]. This opened a branch of the new field of research, that since then, focused on alloys characterized by a high configurational entropy that stabilizes the formation of disordered solid solutions. As the research of the new material concept proceeded, the formerly mentioned rigid borders became more loosely defined, stating that the content of elements may vary between 5 – 35 at. %, the mixing enthalpy stabilizes the formation of the solid solution while the atomic diameters, as well as valence electron concentration, shall be also considered.