Room-Temperature Plastic Deformation of Strontium Titanate Crystals Grown from Different Chemical Compositions
Oxide materials have the potential to exhibit superior mechanical properties in terms of high yield point, high melting point, and high chemical stability. Despite this, they are not widely used as a structural material due to their brittle nature. However, this study shows enhanced room-temperature plasticity of strontium titanate (SrTiO3) crystals through the control of the chemical composition. It is shown that the deformation behavior of SrTiO3 crystals at room temperature depends on the Sr/Ti ratio. It was found that flow stresses in deforming SrTiO3 crystals grown from a powder with the particular ratio of Sr/Ti = 1.04 are almost independent of the strain rate because of the high mobility of dislocations in such crystals. As a result, the SrTiO3 crystals can deform by dislocation slip up to a strain of more than 10%, even at a very high strain rate of 10% per second. It is thus demonstrated that SrTiO3 crystals can exhibit excellent plasticity when chemical composition in the crystal is properly controlled.
Nonstoichiometric [012] dislocation in strontium titanate
Abstract Dislocations are one-dimensional lattice defects in crystalline materials, and unique atomic configurations at their core can affect functional properties of materials. Here we report on a [012] dislocation having a nonstoichiometric core structure in strontium titanate (SrTiO 3 ). TEM and STEM observations showed that a (001) low-angle tilt grain boundary consists of two types of dislocations. One is a [001] edge dislocation that compensates a tilt angle of the boundary as found in previous studies. The other is a [012] dislocation with both edge and screw component. This dislocation is considered to be formed to compensate a slight twist angle of the boundary. It is interesting that the [012] dislocations have a specific core structure with the dissociation into three partial dislocations of b  = 1/2 [011], [001] and 1/2 [011]. At stacking faults formed with the dissociation, two (001) Ti-O layers were located to be neighbors across the stacking fault plane due to missing of a (001) Sr-O layer. In addition, the energy of the stacking fault was estimated to be 0.4 J/m 2 from the separation distances between partial dislocations. It is suggested that the [012] dislocation is formed due to presence of the nonstoichiometric stacking fault structure with low energy.
Microstructure of the solder-casting zone in bridges of dental gold alloys.
The composition and structure were studied in the cast and in the solder of bridges which had failed clinically. Both materials were gold alloys but with different contents of Pt, Ag and Zn. The metallographic investigation revealed defects mostly in the solder, situated in the subsurface layer. SEM studied of the fracture surface revealed large porosites and a structure of dense parallel lines--striations--, indicating that the material had failed from fatigue. The materials in the fractured bridges were identified by micro-probe measurements. It was stated that cast material and solder material used together, were of different composition.