Stabilization of boron carbide via silicon doping

Proctor, JE; Bhakhri, V; Hao, R; Prior, TJ; Scheler, T; Gregoryanz, E; Chhowalla, M; Giuliani, F

Abstract

Boron carbide is one of the lightest and hardest ceramics, but its applications are limited by its poor stability against a partial phase separation into separate boron and carbon. Phase separation is observed under high non-hydrostatic stress (both static and dynamic), resulting in amorphization. The phase separation is thought to occur in just one of the many naturally occurring polytypes in the material, and this raises the possibility of doping the boron carbide to eliminate this polytype. In this work, we have synthesized boron carbide doped with silicon. We have conducted a series of characterizations (transmission electron microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, Raman spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction) on pure and silicon-doped boron carbide following static compression to 50 GPa non-hydrostatic pressure. We find that the level of amorphization under static non-hydrostatic pressure is drastically reduced by the silicon-doping.

Citation

Proctor, J., Bhakhri, V., Hao, R., Prior, T., Scheler, T., Gregoryanz, E., …Giuliani, F. (2015). Stabilization of boron carbide via silicon doping. Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter, 27(1), 015401. https://doi.org/10.1088/0953-8984/27/1/015401

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Nov 3, 2014
• Online Publication Date: Nov 27, 2014
• Publication Date: Jan 14, 2015
• Deposit Date: Jul 31, 2015
• Publicly Available Date: Oct 5, 2016
• Journal: Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter
• Print ISSN: 0953-8984
• Electronic ISSN: 1361-648X
• Publisher: IOP Publishing
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 27
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 015401
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1088/0953-8984/27/1/015401
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/0953-8984/27/1/015401
• Related Public URLs: http://iopscience.iop.org/0953-8984
• Additional Information: Funders : UK Centre for Defence Enterprise;Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC); Projects : Materials and Structures Science and Technology Centre; Grant Number: DSTLX 1000045292; Grant Number: EP/F033605/1