Deformation of Copper Nanowire under Coupled Tension–Torsion Loading

Metallic nanowires (NWs) are essential building blocks for flexible electronics, and experience different deformation modes due to external mechanical loading. Using atomistic simulations, this work investigated the deformation behavior of copper nanowire under coupled tension–torsion loading. A transition in both yielding pattern and dislocation pattern were observed with varying torsion/tension strain ratios. Specifically, increasing the torsion/tension strain ratio (with larger torsional strain) triggered the nucleation of different partial dislocations in the slip system. At low torsion/tension strain ratios, plastic deformation of the nanowire was dominated by stacking faults with trailing partial dislocations pinned at the surface, shifting to two partial dislocations with stacking faults as the strain ratio increases. More interestingly, the NW under tension-dominated loading exhibited a stacking fault structure after yielding, whereas torsion-dominated loading resulted in a three-dimensional dislocation network within the structure. This work thus suggests that the deformation behavior of the NW varies depending on the coupled mechanical loading, which could be beneficial for various engineering applications.