Thermodynamic analysis of the La–Mg–Ni bulk metallic glass system

Phase equilibria of the La–Mg–Ni system have been analyzed and a complete thermodynamic description is obtained. The thermodynamic descriptions of the three binary systems are taken from the literature. Most of the binary intermetallic phases, except La2Mg17, LaNi3, and La2Ni7_L, are assumed to have zero solubility in the ternary system. Based on the experimental data, seven stable ternary intermetallic phases were taken into consideration in this system. Among them, two ternary compounds were treated as semi-stoichiometric compounds based on the ternary experimental results. The rest were treated as stoichiometric compounds. The calculated phase equilibria were in agreement with the available experimental data. Moreover, with the help of the optimized parameters, the composition dependencies of glass formation ability in the La–Mg–Ni system were predicted by searching local minima of driving forces for crystallization, and the prediction of glass formation ability agrees with the experimental results.