Junction formation rates, residence times, and the rate of plastic flow in FCC metals

During plastic flow in metals, dislocations from slip systems with different glide planes collide to form junctions. After being in-residence within the dislocation network for some period of time, these junctions then break, thereby liberating the attached dislocation lines. In this work we use random forest discrete dislocation dynamics simulations to quantify the junction formation rate and junction residence time as a function of stress for all junction types in face-centered cubic metals. We then relate these quantities to the dislocation link-length distribution, which is found to exhibit an exponential form. This enables us to quantify the mean junction strength and also the slip system interaction coefficients. Finally, using the link-length model we obtain a flow rule for our systems which is physics-based with all parameters determined from DDD simulations. The insights here provide a path forward for a dislocation network theory of plastic flow based on the link-length distribution.