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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 February 2011
The effect of epitaxial stress on the stability of Au-Ni solid solutions grown by MBE on Au(001) is investigated. Experimental studies (TEM, GIXD) have shown that the elastic energy of the AuNi alloys is relaxed via two competing ways: twinning and an ordering process in which pseudo-periodic antiphase structures based on the L10 unit cell are found. The stabilisation of a metastable ordered L10 phase in the stressed Au-Ni system is explained using thermodynamic calculations based on the minimisation of free energy including elastic contributions.