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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 February 2011
The characteristic features of the brittle-to-ductile transition are explained using a model of cooperative dislocation generation. In two dimensions, the onset of the ductile behavior corresponds to a thermally-driven, stress-assisted dissociation of many atomic-size dislocation dipoles in the vicinity of the crack tip above a critical temperature Tc. The instability is caused by thermally induced screening of dislocation interactions as in the Kosterlitz-Thouless phase transition. However, the critical temperature is well below the melting temperature in the presence of a stress. The nature of dislocation dynamics in the vicinity of the crack tip is also described and its role in the onset of the cooperative instability is examined. The origin of the correlation between the strain-rate dependence of the transition temperature and the temperature dependence of dislocation mobility is explained.