Background

This collaborative research effort is funded jointly by the:
• European Commission, NMP Priority and the
• US National Science Foundation, Division of Materials Research. Four US principal investigators and four EU principal investigators are involved.

The aim is to develop and validate a computational approach to understand and predict unique plasticity phenomena at the nano and sub-micron scales. This will be accomplished using ab-initio, atomistic, and Peierls approaches to support a direct comparison between dislocation dynamics level modeling and novel sub-micron-scale compression pillar testing.

Recently, a combination of advances in synthesis, characterization, and computational techniques has revealed striking plasticity phenomena that are not explained by traditional crystal plasticity or more recent strain gradient theories. These phenomena are associated with shrinking sample size to the sub-micron regime and decreasing structural length scales such as grain size to the nano-scale regime. An exciting prospect is that new deformation regimes have been identified which, if understood, could enable the development of materials with unrivaled strength.

Principal outcomes of this research effort are:
• The proposed, focused interaction using several computational techniques will provide the basis for a new plasticity theory for sub-micron and nano-scale components.
• Computational and experimental findings will be packaged into an open web site for use by the academic and industrial communities.
• A unique educational environment for participating graduate students that offers international exchange of researchers and computational techniques.
• A series of web-based lectures that will teach the basis of each of the computational materials methods used in the program.