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Concept
Intermetallic
Summary
An intermetallic (also called an intermetallic compound, intermetallic alloy, ordered intermetallic alloy, and a long-range-ordered alloy) is a type of metallic alloy that forms an ordered solid-state compound between two or more metallic elements. Intermetallics are generally hard and brittle, with good high-temperature mechanical properties. They can be classified as stoichiometric or nonstoichiometic intermetallic compounds.
Although the term "intermetallic compounds", as it applies to solid phases, has been in use for many years, its introduction was regretted, for example by Hume-Rothery in 1955.
Schulze in 1967 defined intermetallic compounds as solid phases containing two or more metallic elements, with optionally one or more non-metallic elements, whose crystal structure differs from that of the other constituents. Under this definition, the following are included:
Electron (or Hume-Rothery) compounds
Size packing phases. e.g. Laves phases, Frank–Kasper phases and Nowotny phases
Zintl phases
The definition of a metal is taken to include:
post-transition metals, i.e. aluminium, gallium, indium, thallium, tin, lead, and bismuth.
metalloids, e.g. silicon, germanium, arsenic, antimony and tellurium.
Homogeneous and heterogeneous solid solutions of metals, and interstitial compounds (such as carbides and nitrides), are excluded under this definition. However, interstitial intermetallic compounds are included, as are alloys of intermetallic compounds with a metal.
In common use, the research definition, including post-transition metals and metalloids, is extended to include compounds such as cementite, Fe3C. These compounds, sometimes termed interstitial compounds, can be stoichiometric, and share similar properties to the intermetallic compounds defined above.
The term intermetallic is used to describe compounds involving two or more metals such as the cyclopentadienyl complex Cp6Ni2Zn4.
A B2 intermetallic compound has equal numbers of atoms of two metals such as aluminium and iron, arranged as two interpenetrating simple cubic lattices of the component metals.
Official source
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