Atomistic study of dislocation cores in aluminium and copper

Abstract

The core structure of an edge dislocation, dissociated or not, has been investigated through atomistic calculations. The simulation relies on two N-body phenomenological potentials for aluminium and copper. The various dislocation configurations are characterized in terms of strains and energies for both materials. The limit of validity of the elastic theory of dislocations is then discussed by comparing its predictions to those obtained by simulation.