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Research on the coating formation of Al-induced electroless plating on metallic surfaces

  • Metals & corrosion
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Abstract

According to the design concept of hollow metallic microlattices, the quality of the coating has a considerable influence on the performance of the material. To avoid the effect of by-products in the coatings, we have chosen the Al-induced electroless plating method to respond to the composition design of this material. In this paper, the coatings formation process of Al-induced electroless plating on the metallic surface is systematically investigated. The coatings created by Al-induced electroless plating were characterized by surface morphology, XRD patterns, and electrochemical potential. Subsequently, the deposition process of elements on the metallic substrate was simulated by molecular dynamics. Finally, the surface morphology changes of coatings were observed at different plating times to verify the simulation results. The results indicate that the four kinds of coatings are each composed of a single metal element (copper, cobalt, nickel, and iron) with no by-products. Based on the results of morphology changes of the coatings and the deposition simulation, the overall formation process of Al-induced electroless plating is described. The deposition of coatings has the characteristics of preferential growth and aggregate growth. The metal atoms that are generated from the reaction of the reducing electrons with the target metallic ions in the solutions are deposited on the substrate surface as the primary cores. The reducing electrons are provided by the dissolution of Al foil. With the increase in the number of generated metal atoms, multiple atomic clusters form in the areas of the primary cores. These clusters develop at various scales on the substrate surface, forming irregular particles. Eventually, coatings are formed completely with uniform particle sizes.

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Data availability

The data reported in this paper is available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Code availability

The main codes in this paper are from the official LAMMPS website: https://www.lammps.org. The codes used in this paper are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request as well.

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Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 52075123) and the Foundation of Key Laboratory of Superlight Materials & Surface Technology of Ministry of Education (No. HEU10202201).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Materials Science and Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150001, People’s Republic of China

    Guixin Dai, Shiping Wu, Xixi Huang & Mingjie Wang

  2. Key Laboratory of Superlight Materials and Surface Technology, Ministry of Education, Harbin Engineering University, Harbin, People’s Republic of China

    Ruizhi Wu

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Dai, G., Wu, S., Huang, X. et al. Research on the coating formation of Al-induced electroless plating on metallic surfaces. J Mater Sci 58, 3768–3789 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-023-08238-4

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