Scale effects for strength, ductility, and toughness in “brittle” materials

Decreasing scales effectively increase nearly all important mechanical properties of at least some “brittle” materials below 100 nm. With an emphasis on silicon nanopillars, nanowires, and nanospheres, it is shown that strength, ductility, and toughness all increase roughly with the inverse radius o...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of materials research 2009-03, Vol.24 (3), p.898-906
Main Authors: Gerberich, W.W., Michler, J., Mook, W.M., Ghisleni, R., Östlund, F., Stauffer, D.D., Ballarini, R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Applied and Technical Physics
Biomaterials
Inorganic Chemistry
Materials Engineering
Materials Science
Nanoindentation
Nanostructure
Nanotechnology
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Summary:Decreasing scales effectively increase nearly all important mechanical properties of at least some “brittle” materials below 100 nm. With an emphasis on silicon nanopillars, nanowires, and nanospheres, it is shown that strength, ductility, and toughness all increase roughly with the inverse radius of the appropriate dimension. This is shown experimentally as well as on a mechanistic basis using a proposed dislocation shielding model. Theoretically, this collects a reasonable array of semiconductors and ceramics onto the same field using fundamental physical parameters. This gives proportionality between fracture toughness and the other mechanical properties. Additionally, this leads to a fundamental concept of work per unit fracture area, which predicts the critical event for brittle fracture. In semibrittle materials such as silicon, this can occur at room temperature when the scale is sufficiently small. When the local stress associated with dislocation nucleation increases to that sufficient to break bonds, an instability occurs resulting in fracture.
ISSN:0884-2914
2044-5326
DOI:10.1557/jmr.2009.0143