Fig. 1. (a) Representative cross-sectional TEM micrograph of the CLCA film. The three ALs, i.e., ALs ‘Ⅰ’, ‘Ⅱ’, and ‘Ⅲ’, are divided by two CLs indicated by the white arrows. Note that the TEM image was taken from CLCAannealed and the inset is a representative HRTEM image of a thin CL. (b) XRD patterns of CLCAas-deposited, CLCAquenched, and CLCAannealed.

Fig. 2. Representative HRTEM micrographs of different ALs in three CLCA films: (a-c), (d-f), and (g-i) refer to the ALs ‘Ⅰ’-‘Ⅲ’ in CLCAas-deposited, CLCAquenched, and CLCAannealed, respectively, with corresponding SAD images shown in insets.

Fig. 3. (a) Comparison of hardness at a strain rate of 0.2 s-1 with different h among CLCAas-deposited, CLCAquenched, and CLCAannealed, as well as (b) the extracted hardness increment (ΔH) varies with h in the CLCA film after quenching and annealing treatments.

Fig. 4. (a) Representative engineering stress-strain curves of the three CLCA pillars (the inset is the enlarged image of the deformation part indicated by the rectangle) and the corresponding SEM images for the (b) CLCAas-deposited, (c) CLCAquenched, and (d) CLCAannealed pillars (the insets are the SEM images of the as-fabricated pillars, correspondingly).

Fig. 5. Representative engineering stress-strain curves and the corresponding SEM images of the CLCAas-deposited and CLCAquenched pillars indented to a relatively low strain of (a) ～ 0.18 and (b) ～0.40.

Fig. 6. SEM images of residual impressions with h of 1 μm at a strain rate of 0.2 s-1 in (a) CLCAas-deposited and (b) CLCAquenched.

Fig. 7. Cross-sectional TEM micrographs of the residual impressions obtained at the h of 1 μm for (a) CLCAas-deposited and (d) CLCAquenched. The TEM samples were fabricated by a FIB system in the positions indicated by the yellow lines in Fig. 7 (c) and (f). The regions indicated by rectangles i, ii, iii, and iv are enlarged in (b), (c), (f) and (e), respectively, of which (c) and (f) represent the regions right underneath the indenter, while (b) and (e) represent the regions relatively far away from the indenter tip. The inserted SAD images with tag numbers 1-6 are corresponding to the regions indicated by the yellow circles with the same tag numbers.

Fig. 8. HRTEM images of (a) more-sheared region and (b) less-sheared region in CLCAas-deposited, as well as (c) more-sheared region and (d) less-sheared region in CLCAquenched. The dashed yellow line in (a) represents the boundary between SB and the un-sheared region, and the yellow arrow indicates the shear direction.