The microstructure and mechanical properties of Al-20Si produced by selective laser melting (SLM) are investigated for different heat treatment conditions. As a result of the high cooling rate during processing, the as-built SLM material displays a microstructure consisting of a supersaturated Al(Si) solid solution along with heavily refined eutectic Si and Si particles. The Si particles become coarser, and the eutectic Si gradually changes its morphology from fibrous to plate-like shape with increasing annealing temperature. The microstructural variations occurring during heat treatment significantly affect the mechanical behavior of the samples. The yield and ultimate strengths decrease from 374 and 506 MPa for the as-built SLM material to 162 and 252 MPa for the sample annealed at 673 K, whereas the ductility increases from 1.6 to 8.7%. This offers the possibility to tune microstructure and corresponding properties of the Al-20Si SLM parts to meet specific requirements.

We used selective laser melting (SLM) and hot pressing of mechanically-alloyed β-type Ti–40Nb powder to fabricate macroporous bulk specimens (solid cylinders). The total porosity, compressive strength, and compressive elastic modulus of the SLM-fabricated material were determined as 17% ± 1%, 968 ± 8 MPa, and 33 ± 2 GPa, respectively. The alloy’s elastic modulus is comparable to that of healthy cancellous bone. The comparable results for the hot-pressed material were 3% ± 2%, 1400 ± 19 MPa, and 77 ± 3 GPa. This difference in mechanical properties results from different porosity and phase composition of the two alloys. Both SLM-fabricated and hot-pressed cylinders demonstrated good in vitro biocompatibility. The presented results suggest that the SLM-fabricated alloy may be preferable to the hot-pressed alloy for biomedical applications, such as the manufacture of load-bearing metallic components for total joint replacements.

A prerequisite to utilize the full potential of structural heterogeneities for improving the room-temperature plastic deformation of bulk metallic glasses (BMGs) is to understand their interaction with the mechanism of shear band formation and propagation. This task requires the ability to artificially create heterogeneous microstructures with controlled morphology and orientation. Here, we analyze the effect of the designed heterogeneities generated by imprinting on the tensile mechanical behavior of the Zr_52.5Ti₅Cu₁₈Ni_14.5Al₁₀ BMG by using experimental and computational methods. The imprinted material is elastically heterogeneous and displays anisotropic mechanical properties: strength and ductility increase with increasing the loading angle between imprints and tensile direction. This behavior occurs through shear band branching and their progressive rotation. Molecular dynamics and finite element simulations indicate that shear band branching and rotation originates at the interface between the heterogeneities, where the characteristic atomistic mechanism responsible for shear banding in a homogeneous glass is perturbed.