When metal alloys are processed during manufacturing, the atoms of the combined elements are mixed together at random, according to conventional wisdom – but new research challenges this thinking, revealing hidden atomic patterns that persist.

The study is the work of researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and it promises to open up new ways to control the properties of metals during manufacturing

Recent lab studies have identified subtle patterns in metal alloys that can be tweaked to enhance the material's properties, including mechanical strength, durability and radiation tolerance. This new study reveals in simulations how those patterns – and some new ones – emerge and linger even after intense processing.

"This is the first paper showing these non-equilibrium states that are retained in the metal," says MIT materials scientist Rodrigo Freitas.

"Right now, this chemical order is not something we're controlling for or paying attention to when we manufacture metals."

Understanding the new findings is a little tricky if you're not already familiar with the physics of metal alloys, but the chemical short-range order (SRO) that the researchers were looking at in this study is the arrangement that atoms fall into in metal alloys