Strain softening mechanism at meso scale during micro-compression in an ultrafine-grained pure copper

Strain softening behavior has been found at meso scale using micro-compression testing in an ultrafine-grained (UFG) pure copper by comparison with the typical strain hardening in conventional coarse-grained (CG) material. Microstructural observations show that grain size remains nearly the same including the fraction of high-angle grain boundaries during micro-compression in UFG pure copper. The Kernel average misorientation(KAM) distribution measured by electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD), as a statistical method, is applied to qualitatively evaluate dislocation density in the interior of the grains. It is suggested that the deformation mechanisms are dominated by grain boundary sliding and grain rotation accompanied by dislocation slip in UFG pure copper, which demonstrates that the strain softening behavior is primarily caused by dislocation annihilation during micro-compression.