Power-law behavior of spatio-temporal structural fluctuations in a metallic glass

I report on the power-law behavior of spatio-temporal structural fluctuations brought about by transient, metastable atom-cluster formation during radiation-induced solid-state amorphizing transformation in a NiTi intermetallic compound, investigated by using a combination of in situ observations inside a high-resolution high-voltage electron microscope and molecular dynamics simulation. The present nanoscale dynamical study provides direct evidence that a system under irradiation, as a nonequilibrium open (or energy-dissipative) system, invites the inherent structural transition to an ideal-glass state in amorphous materials and the multirelaxation effect in spatio-temporal fluctuations.