Surface Rebound of Relativistic Dislocations Directly and Efficiently Initiates Deformation Twinning

• Main Authors: Li, Qing-Jie (Author), Li, Ju (Contributor), Shan, Zhi-Wei (Author), Ma, Evan (Author)
• Other Authors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering (Contributor)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: American Physical Society, 2017-06-14T17:54:24Z.
• Subjects: Article
• Online Access: Get fulltext

Under ultrahigh stresses (e.g., under high strain rates or in small-volume metals) deformation twinning (DT) initiates on a very short time scale, indicating strong spatial-temporal correlations in dislocation dynamics. Using atomistic simulations, here we demonstrate that surface rebound of relativistic dislocations directly and efficiently triggers DT under a wide range of laboratory experimental conditions. Because of its stronger temporal correlation, surface rebound sustained relay of partial dislocations is shown to be dominant over the conventional mechanism of thermally activated nucleation of twinning dislocations.
National Science Foundation (U.S.) (Grant DMR-1410636)