Recent insights into corrosion initiation at the nanoscale

Localized corrosion compromises the durability of high-strength aluminium alloys and challenges the value of these high-performance materials. Currently, the role of structures (especially nanostructures) that lead to localized corrosion initiation is not well understood due primarily to the difficulty of characterizing chemistry and structure at the atomic scales. Development of new alloys will add to the complexity arising from the emergence of heterogeneous structure/chemistry of new types of coarse intermetallic particles at the nanoscale. These complex structures might include inclusions containing residual deformation or small amounts of less considered elements, such as Mg or Li in particles consisting of Al, Cu, Fe, Mn, and Si elements. Besides, from nano- to even microscales, high-density structural features induced during deformation processes are prone sites of preferential attack. These aspects are interesting topics of ongoing research in alloy development and new applications should spur further investigations of their atomic-scale corrosion initiation.