The role of back stress in sub-50 nm Si nanocubes

Article history: Received 11 November 2015 Received in revised form 2 December 2015 Accepted 3 December 2015 Available online xxxx Development of more accurate descriptions of dislocation motion requires understanding the actual effective stress driving it. Back stresses from dislocation pile-ups can work against the applied stress resulting in lower stresses acting on moving dislocations. This study presents calculations of back stress derived from in-situ compression of 26–39 nm sized single crystal silicon cubes inside the transmission electronmicroscope. These initially dislocation free particles exhibited yielding culminating in over 60% plastic strain. The back stress was calculated based on a pile-upmodelwhich,when subtracted from the applied stress, suggests a constant effective stress for continuing plasticity. © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.