Computational design - development of advanced low-cost multi-element lightweight alloys

全球油价下滑严重影响了高度依赖油砂工业的阿尔伯塔省的经济。阿尔伯塔需要多样化和发展多种工业部门，以实现长期的可持续经济。该项目的最终目标是建立一个位于艾伯塔省的轻质材料研究中心，这将有助于为加拿大运输行业发展当地的轻质材料制造能力，并吸引未来全国或全球的投资，以发展阿尔伯塔自己的运输车辆业务。 工业铝基和镁基轻质合金在节约燃料和降低有害排放方面得到了广泛的应用。然而，这些合金强度不够，仍然存在性能和安全问题。在这个项目中，我们将开发多元素轻质合金，其性能上级传统合金。根据最近对高熵合金的研究，这是可以实现的-这是2004年首次提出的创新概念。令人鼓舞的轻质高熵合金（LWHEA）已经生产出来。然而，目前的LWHEA虽然具有较高的硬度，但尚未表现出足够的延展性。此外，其成本较高是另一个问题。 本项目拟开发低成本多元Mg-Al-Xi（i=1，2，3，.）轻质合金多元素（Xi）将以低量使用。我们将使用完善的计算技术，主要是第一原理方法，设计合金与实验验证。将制造高性能原型合金，并提供给汽车行业的潜在用户进行评估。在汽车行业潜在用户的帮助下，建立合作伙伴关系和探索未来的商业化道路是非常可预见的。我们相信，该项目的成功将有助于启动为阿尔伯塔的新工业部门铺平道路的工作，有助于加强阿尔伯塔经济的可持续性，从而使阿尔伯塔人在各个方面受益。

The global oil price slide has heavily impacted the economy of Alberta, which highly relies on its oil sand industry. Alberta needs to diversify and develop multiple industrial sectors for sustainable economy in the long run. The ultimate goal of this project is to establish an Alberta-based Lightweight Materials Research Center, which would help develop local lightweight material manufacturing capability for the Canadian transportation industry and attract future investment nation-wide or globally for developing Alberta's own transportation vehicles' business. Commercial Al and Mg based lightweight alloys have been widely used for fuel saving and reduced harmful emission. However, the alloys are not sufficiently strong, still having performance and safety concerns. In this project, we will develop multi-element lightweight alloys with superior properties over the conventional alloys. This is achievable based on recent studies on high-entropy alloys - an innovative concept proposed initially in 2004. Encouraging lightweight high-entropy alloys (LWHEA) have been produced. However, the current LWHEAs, while possessing higher hardness, have not yet demonstrated sufficient ductility. Besides, their higher cost is another issue. This project is proposed to develop low-cost multi-element Mg-Al-Xi (i=1, 2, 3, ...) lightweight alloys. Multi-elements (Xi) will be used with low quantity. We will use well-established computational techniques, mainly the first-principle method, to design alloys with experimental verification. High-performance prototype alloys will be fabricated and provided to potential users in the automotive industry to evaluate. With the assistance from the potential users in the automotive business, building partnerships and exploring future commercialization paths are highly foreseeable. We believe that the success of this project would help trigger initiation of paving the path to a new industrial sector in Alberta, helping strengthen Alberta economy with higher sustainability and consequently benefiting Albertans in various aspects.