ABSTRACT The pursuit of simultaneously high wear resistance and excellent lubrication in multi‐principal element alloy (MPEA) composites is often hindered by a fundamental trade‐off, which is exacerbated by the agglomeration of high‐content graphene reinforcements. This compromise becomes particularly severe in composites with high‐content graphene reinforcements, whose agglomeration leads to embrittlement and lubrication failure. Here, a flake powder–metallurgy strategy is developed to construct a self‐assembled lamellar structure in graphene/CoCrNi MPEA composites (Gr/MPEA AL ). This approach enables the uniform dispersion of a high graphene content (3.0 wt%), which is unattainable by conventional methods. The resulting composite exhibits a rare dual enhancement in performance: an order‐of‐magnitude improvement in wear resistance coupled with a low coefficient of friction. Intriguingly, the tribological behavior shows significant anisotropy, with optimal performance observed when sliding perpendicular to the lamellae. Through a multi‐scale methodology combining molecular dynamics simulations, finite element analysis, and systematic experiments, it is revealed that this exceptional performance stems from the synergy of high‐density deformation nanotwins, efficient strain delocalization, and abundant graphene‐derived lubricating sites. This work establishes a general paradigm for designing composite architectures that reconcile traditionally incompatible properties, offering broad implications for developing next‐generation structural materials with integrated mechanical robustness and surface functionality for safety‐critical applications.
Ye et al. (2026) studied this question.