A new type of damage-tolerant metallic glass that demonstrates a strength and toughness beyond that of any known material has been developed and tested by a collaboration of researchers with the US Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Labs and the California Inst of Technology. What's more, even better versions of this new glass may be on the way. The new metallic glass is a microalloy featuring palladium, a metal with a high "bulk-to-shear" stiffness ratio that counteracts the intrinsic brittleness of glassy materials. Robert Ritchie, the materials scientist who led the Berkeley contribution to the research said: "Because of the high bulk-to-shear modulus ratio of palladium-containing material, the energy needed to form shear bands is much lower than the energy required to turn these shear bands into cracks - the result is that glass undergoes extensive plasticity in response to stress, allowing it to bend rather than crack."
