Abstract
We have applied the Mössbauer effect to study the local atomic environments in metastable crystalline alloys (1≤x≤12) produced by rapid quenching from the melt. For concentrations up to 9 at. % B, the spectra revealed the existence of three distinct sites, characterized by room-temperature hyperfine fields of 330, 267, and 236 kOe, the first of which is that of Fe in bcc α-Fe. The other two sites were populated in the ratio 1:2, while the total amount of Fe atoms in them was nearly three times the number of B atoms present in the alloys. Furthermore, the temperature dependences of the hyperfine fields at these two sites were the same, although distinctly different from that of the α-Fe site. The Mössbauer results presented here, together with a nuclear-magnetic-resonance investigation previously reported, demonstrate that these alloys are not random solid solutions. Instead, they indicate that the alloys consist of a dispersion of very small regions, which have an orthorhombic-B-like structure, embedded in an α-Fe matrix.
- Received 17 April 1986
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.34.4738
©1986 American Physical Society