Crystal structure

Defect in crystal structure

1) Point defects

Vacancy
• Decrease in density
• No. of vacancy defects depends on temperature
Interstitial
• Density increase
• atomic distortion
Substitutional
• No change in density
Schottky
• Vacancy defect in ioinc Crystal
• Decrease density
Frenkel detect
• Displace of ion
• No change in density

2) line detects
• The presence of dislocation results in lattice strain (distortion). The direction and magnitude
of such distortion is expressed in terms of a Burgers vector
• For BCC burgers vector is represented as (a/2) <hkl>. For FCC burgers vector is (a/2) <hkl>.
While for simple cubic it is a <hkl>.
• Elastic energy of dislocation is proportional to the square of Burgers vector. It is given by
Eelastic = lGb^2. Here l is length, G is shear modulus and E is an elastic energy of dislocation.
This is known as Frank’s rule.
•

Edge dislocation
• Edge dislocation occurs due to the introduction or elimination of an extra row of atoms.
• Edge dislocation line moves parallel to applied stress.
• Shear, Tensile and Compressive stress fields may be present in the Edge dislocation.
• In this dislocation, Burger’s vectors always perpendicular to the dislocation line.
• Region of lattice disturbance extends along an edge inside a crystal.
• Edge dislocation cannot cross slip and can climb.
• This dislocation occurs due to climb and glide motion.
• There are two types of Edge dislocation, positive and negative.
• The dislocation line moving up by one atomic spacing from the original slip plane is a positive
climb. It involves diffusion of vacancies. While negative climb involves interstitial diffusion.
• Elastic strain energy of a is lGb^2(3/2) for edge dislocation. Here G is shear modulus, l is
length and b is Burgers vector.
• Dislocations of opposite sign on the same slip plane will attract each other.
• Edge dislocations have unsymmetrical stress field therefore no. of interactions can occur
between parallel edge dislocations.

Screw dislocation
• Screw dislocation provides easy crystal growth because of additional unit cells and atoms
can be added to the screw.
• Shear, Tensile and Compressive stress fields are absent in the Screw dislocation.
• Screw dislocation line moves perpendicular to applied stress
• In this dislocation, Burger’s vectors always parallel to the dislocation line.
• Region of lattice disturbance is in two separate planes and cross each other at right angles.
• Screw dislocation can cross slip and cannot climb.
• A pure screw dislocation has no extra half plane of atoms. Therefore, it cannot climb. It can
change a slip plane by cross slip.
• This dislocation occurs only due to glide motion.
• Screw dislocation does not show any type like edge dislocation.
• Elastic strain energy of a screw dislocation is lGb^2 for Here G is shear modulus, l is length
and b is Burgers vector.
• Screw dislocations of opposite sign having same Burgers vector will attract. It will attract
with a force per unit length of Gb^2/2πr.
• Two parallel edge dislocations having same sign rest on the same plane repel each other.

Glide
• The plane, which contains a Burgers vector and tangent vector both, allows dislocation
motion. This motion is known as glide. This plane is commonly close packed plane.
• Glide is also known as conservative motion
Climb
• Climb is a thermal activated process. Climb requires diffusion of point defects. On low
temperature diffusion is negligible due to very low concentration.

3) Planer defects
Grain boundary
• occur where the crystallographic direction of the lattice abruptly changes.
•
Stacking faults
Twin boundary
• introduces a plane of mirror symmetry in the ordering of a crystal
4) Plastics deformation

Slipping
1. It occurs in discrete multiples of atomic spacing.
2. The orientation of the crystal above and below the slip plane is the same after deformation as
before.
3. It occurs over wide planes.
4. Slip begins when shearing stress on the slip plane in the slip direction reaches a threshold
value called the critical resolved shear stress.
5. It takes place in several milli seconds.
6. Slip lines do not appear during any heat treatment.
7. Slip lines disappear after grinding or other surface finishing operations.
8. Slip lines may be present in even or odd numbers.
9. Most in FCC and BCC structure
10. Results in large deformation
• BCC crystals have slip plane {110}.
• In BCC crystals slip direction is <110>
• FCC crystals have slip plane {111}.
• HCP crystals have slip plane is (0001)
• In HCP crystals, slip systems are limited. Limited number of slip planes makes slip difficult.

Twinning
1. Atom movements are much less than the atomic spacing.
2. Orientation difference takes place across the twin plane.
3. Every atomic plane is involved.
4. There is no critical resolved shear stress for twinning.
5. It takes place in a few microseconds.
6. Twin lines appear during the annealing operation of materials.
7. Twin lines run through the whole depth of the material and hence do not disappear on grinding
etc.
8. Twin lines always occur in pairs
9. Most is in HCP structure
10. results in small deformation
11. Twinning plane for FCC metals is
{1 1 1} plane. These are known as octahedral planes. Twinning can only occur on this plane
family.
12. Twinning plane for BCC metals is {1 1 2}. Twinning can take place only on these planes.
13. HCP crystals, twinning plane is. {1 0 -1- 2}. Twinning occurs on these planes.
14. {0 1 1} are the twinning planes for rhombohedral crystals.

• The B.C.C. and H.C.P. metals undergo plastic deformation by Twinning in combination with
slip
• Climb is a dislocation movement in which dislocation moves from one slip plane to another
 slip plane. Where as Glide is a dislocation movement in which dislocation moves within
the same slip plane.

Structure
simple cubic structure : Manganese , fluorspar,
Zinc blend : tetrahedron

• Shear stress is the component of stress. In a perfect crystal, not displacement takes place.
So shear stress is zero.
• Dislocations are generated during slip mostly. Slip causes shear in the crystal. This shear
introduces dislocations at high shear stress.
•

Last modified: 16 Jun 2020