Molecular dynamics studies on the dislocation gliding near a tilt boundary

Abstract

The gliding behavior of edge dislocation near a grain boundary (GB) in copper under pure shear stresses is simulated by using molecular dynamics(MD) method. Many-body potential incorporating the embedded atom method (EAM) is used. The critical shear stresses for a single disocation to pass across GB surface are obtained at values of σ _c =23MPa ∼ 68 MPa and 137MPa∼274 MPa for Ω=165 small angle tilt GB at 300K and 20K, respectively. The first result agrees with the experimental yield stress σ _y (=42MPa) quite well. It suggests that there might be one of the reasons of initial plastic yielding caused by single dislocation gliding across GB. In addition, there might be possibility to obtain yield strength from microscopic analysis. Moreover, the experimental value of σ _y at low temperature is generally higher than that at room temperature. So, these results are in conformity qualitatively with experimental fact. On the other hand, the Ω=25 GB is too strong an obstacle to the dislocation. In this case, a dislocation is able to pass across GB under relatively low stress only when it is driven by other dislocations. This is taken to mean that dislocation pile-up must be built up in front of this kind of GB, if this GB may take effect on the process of plastic deformation.