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Although hardness has long been regarded as a primary material property which defines wear resistance, there is strong evidence to suggest that the elastic modulus can also have an important influence on wear behaviour. In particular, the elastic strain to failure, which is related to the ratio of hardness (H) and elastic modulus (E), has been shown by a number of authors to be a more suitable parameter for predicting wear resistance than is hardness alone. There is presently considerable interest in the development of nanostructured and nanolayered coatings, due to the fact that materials with extreme mechanical properties (which are difficult to synthesise by other methods) can be created, particularly when using plasma-assisted vacuum processing techniques. Until now, scientific research has been directed mainly towards the achievement of ultra-high hardness, with associated high elastic modulus, the latter …