Variability of structural transformations in bimetallic Cu-Ag nanoalloys

In this work, bimetallic Cu-Ag nanoparticles of five stoichiometric compositions of various sizes were studied by molecular dynamics method using a many body EAM potential. Regularities of the structure formation are established, their characteristic features are described. In particular, in compositions with 10, 70, and 90 at.% Cu content, after the melt cooling, typical fcc structures with intersecting atomic planes of the hcp phase are formed. In compositions of 30 and 50 at.% Cu, the fraction of identified phases does not exceed 20% of the total number of atoms. A tendency to the formation of a core-shell structure was revealed in the case of a high copper content, while in the case of a high silver content, a so-called onion structure is formed. Using the caloric curves of the potential term of the internal energy, the melting and crystallization temperatures were determined. It has been established that the concentration dependences of the melting temperature of bimetallic Cu-Ag nanoparticles have a minimum corresponding to the equiatomic composition for all sizes. For the crystallization temperature, both the concentration dependences and the size dependences are less pronounced, but the minimum value of the crystallization temperature also corresponds to the equiatomic composition for all sizes; with an increase in the size of bimetallic Cu-Ag nanoparticles, a slight increase in the crystallization temperature is observed.