Recently, the nanotwinned structure has attracted considerable attention because of unprecedented improvement in its mechanical properties, thermal stability, and other properties. Here, we introduce the nanotwinned structure between two superhard materials [diamond and cubic boron nitride (cBN)] and obtain a nanotwinned diamond/cBN multilayered material with ultrahigh strength and unprecedented ductility. Under continuous shear deformation, the stress and total energy in the material develop in a zigzag way because of atomic reconfiguration. Further research shows that atomic reconfiguration occurs preferentially in the cBN region, followed by that in the diamond region by partial slip, and finally occurs at the interface through alternate "exchange" of the positions of C and B atoms. This multilevel stress release model can account for the significant increase in the strain range and peak stress of nanotwinned materials. These results could provide available information for the design of superhard materials with multilevel resistance to plastic deformation.
Keywords: atomic reconfiguration; first-principles calculations; nanotwinned multilayer; partial slip; superhard materials.