Revealing the deformation mechanisms of 6H-silicon carbide under nano- cutting

ZH Wu and WD Liu and LC Zhang, COMPUTATIONAL MATERIALS SCIENCE, 137, 282-288 (2017).

DOI: 10.1016/j.commatsci.2017.05.048

6H silicon carbide (6H-SiC) is one of the most commonly used polytypes in commercial SiCs, such as its applications in high-temperature electronic devices, ultra-precision micro/nano dies and high-performance mirrors. However, the deformation mechanisms of 6H-SiC under nano- machining are unclear. This has significantly hindered the development of the material's ductile-regime and damage free machining for micro/nano and miniaturized surfaces. This paper aims to explore such deformation mechanisms with the aid of large-scale molecular dynamics analysis. The results showed that with increasing the depth of cut 6H-SiC undergoes transition from elastic deformation to continuous plastic deformation and then to intermittent cleavage. A dislocation and structural analysis revealed that the plastic deformation of 6H-SiC can be realised via phase transformation from the Wurtzite structure to an amorphous structure, and/or through dislocations on the basal plane and/or pyramidal plane. (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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