Effect of normal stress on the ideal shear strength in covalent crystals

Abstract

Critical shear stress under the superimposed hydrostatic and uniaxial normal stress conditions of C, Si, Ge, and SiC is evaluated by ab initio density functional theory calculations to investigate the response of ideal shear strength (ISS) to superimposed normal stresses in covalent crystals. We find a substantial difference in the responses of ISS to normal stress among the covalent crystals examined; e.g., hydrostatic compression increases the ISS of C but decreases that of Si, Ge, and SiC. The ISS is mostly a highly nonlinear and anisotropic function of normal stress. The results thus indicate that normal stresses can significantly affect the critical shear stress, which is crucial to interpreting experimental observations of crystal deformation, e.g., dislocation nucleation in nanoindentation.