Towards strong and stiff carbon nanotube-reinforced high-strength aluminum alloy composites through a microlaminated architecture design

A microlaminated architecture with aligned interlaminar carbon nanotubes (CNT) was elaborated in Al–Zn–Mg–Cu alloy composites fabricated by flake powder metallurgy. The as-designed composites with 2 vol.% CNT exhibit excellent tensile strength of 820 MPa, Young’s modulus of 88 GPa and ductility of 5%. It is proposed that the synergistic effect of the dominant 〈1 1 1〉 fiber texture and effective load transfer to CNT contributes to the property enhancement over the disordered composites, which supplies a new strategy towards strong and stiff metal matrix composites.