Atomistic simulations of elastic and plastic properties in amorphous silicon

We present here potential-dependent mechanical properties of amorphous silicon studied through molecular dynamics (MD) at low temperature. On average, the localization of elementary plastic events and the co-ordination defect sites appears to be correlated. For Tersoff potential and SW potential the plastic events centered on defect sites prefer 5-fold defect sites, while for modified Stillinger-Weber potential such plastic events choose 3-fold defect sites. We also analyze the non-affine displacement field in amorphous silicon obtained for different shear regime. The non-affine displacement field localizes when plastic events occur and shows elementary shear band formation at higher shear strains. Copyright (C) EPLA, 2009