Combinatorial investigation on corrosion resistance of Ir-Ni-Ta alloys

Metallic glasses are often considered to exhibit remarkable corrosion resistance. However, the respective roles of chemical composition and amorphous structure remain unclear. In this work, we take Ir-Ni-Ta alloy system as a model system and utilize combinatorial fabrication and high-throughput characterizations to reveal the correlations between alloy composition and corrosion current density and corrosion potential. The results indicate strong correlations of corrosion current density with metal-metal bond strength and metal-oxygen bond strength, suggesting that the corrosion of the Ir-Ni-Ta metallic glasses is primarily controlled by chemical composition. However, an amorphous structure can facilitate the formation of denser passive film, and thus superimpose a positive influence on alloys that inherently exhibit corrosion resistance. Our findings would help the designing metallic glasses of superior corrosion resistance.