The structural mechanisms of low-temperature work hardering and fracture of cryogenic metallic materials

The results of original investigations were used to consider and to analyse different physical problematic aspects of fracture and work hardening of metallic materials at low temperatures (the macroscopic behavior, the microstructural processes influencing the plastic flow and work hardening, the mechanisms of fracture nucleation and propagation at the final stage of plastic deformation). The analisis was made from the viewpoint of microstructural state evolution in the course of plastic deformation in a temperature range 300-4.2 K for different types of structural metallic materials. The characteristic physical situations which occur under low-temperature plastic deformation and fracture of solids are summarized and classified.