The probability-correlative oxide particle strengthening in solid-solution alloys

The addition of oxide particle would lead to a remarkable improvement in the mechanical properties in solid-solution alloys, due to their pinning effects for dislocation motion. However, the prediction of the classical oxide particle strengthening model can be not well consistent with the experiments, especially in the transition region from the dislocation cutting mechanism to the Orowan mechanism. Here, a unique predictive model, which considers not only the relative position between the dislocation slip plane and oxide particle center, but also the distribution effect of oxide particle size, is proposed to describe oxide particle strengthening. The calculated results of our work agree well with the experiments, compared with that calculated from the classical oxide particle strengthening theory. The critical particle radius does not rely on the volume fraction of oxide particle, in good agreement with the previous work. Moreover, the optimal oxide size is found to maximize the oxide particle strengthening. The present results provide a universal framework for modeling and analyzing the strengthening behavior of oxide particle strengthened solid-solution alloys.