The plasticity of highly oriented nano-layered Zr/Nb composites

In prior work, bulk lamellar composites of pure zirconium and niobium (Zr/Nb) were manufactured by accumulative roll bonding (ARB). After the substantial amounts of straining required to refine the layers to nanoscale dimensions, formation of highly oriented Zr crystals was observed. In this work, we employ a spatially resolved multiscale crystal plasticity based model in 3D to study the orientational stability of Zr single crystals and Zr/Nb bicrystals during rolling deformation. The analysis reveals that predominant texture components arise due to substantially reduced ratios of slip resistances among the prismatic, pyramidal I , and basal slip systems. In support, density functional theory (DFT) calculations of generalized stacking fault energy curves on these three slip systems suggest that the ratio of critical stresses to form these dislocations are within 2.5 times. This finding of reduced anisotropy in Zr at the nanoscale can provide insight into the design of nano-structuring processes for target textures, such as those containing highly oriented grains. (C) 2016 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.