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Quantitative tests revealing hydrogen-enhanced dislocation motion in α-iron

Nature Materials volume 22, pages 710–716 (2023)Cite this article

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Abstract

Hydrogen embrittlement jeopardizes the use of high-strength steels in critical load-bearing applications. However, uncertainty regarding how hydrogen affects dislocation motion, owing to the lack of quantitative experimental evidence, hinders our understanding of hydrogen embrittlement. Here, by studying the well-controlled, cyclic, bow-out motions of individual screw dislocations in α-iron, we find that the critical stress for initiating dislocation motion in a 2 Pa electron-beam-excited H2 atmosphere is 27–43% lower than that in a vacuum environment, proving that hydrogen enhances screw dislocation motion. Moreover, we find that aside from vacuum degassing, cyclic loading and unloading facilitates the de-trapping of hydrogen, allowing the dislocation to regain its hydrogen-free behaviour. These findings at the individual dislocation level can inform hydrogen embrittlement modelling and guide the design of hydrogen-resistant steels.

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Fig. 1: Schematic of the experimental set-up for revealing the effect of hydrogen on dislocation motion.
Fig. 2: Effect of hydrogenation on the bow-out motion of a screw dislocation.
Fig. 3: Effect of hydrogen degassing on dislocation behaviour.
Fig. 4: Atomistic mechanism of hydrogen-enhanced screw dislocation glide.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding authors upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge support from the Natural Science Foundation of China (51971169 and 52031011) and Shaanxi Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2017JQ5110). D.C. acknowledges support from Shanghai Pujiang Program (21PJ1404800). We thank Y. Qin, D. Zhang, P. Zhang, C. Guo and Q. Fu for assistance in sample preparation and guidance for doing transmission electron microscope experiments. We thank Z. Wang (Xi’an Jiaotong University), S. Ogata (Osaka University), C. Zhou and L. Zhang (Zhejiang University of Technology), and L. Qiao and Y. Su (University of Science and Technology Beijing) for useful discussions.

Author information

Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Longchao Huang, Dengke Chen.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Advancing Materials Performance from the Nanoscale (CAMP-Nano), State Key Laboratory for Mechanical Behavior of Materials, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, People’s Republic of China

    Longchao Huang, Degang Xie, Suzhi Li & Zhiwei Shan

  2. Department of Engineering Mechanics, School of Naval Architecture, Ocean and Civil Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, People’s Republic of China

    Dengke Chen

  3. Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering and Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Yin Zhang & Ju Li

  4. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Ting Zhu

  5. Max-Planck-Institut für Eisenforschung, Düsseldorf, Germany

    Dierk Raabe

  6. Center for Alloy Innovation and Design (CAID), State Key Laboratory for Mechanical Behavior of Materials, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, People’s Republic of China

    En Ma

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Contributions

Z.S. and D.X. designed and supervised the project. L.H. and D.X. conducted the experiments and analysed the experimental data. D.C. performed the simulations under the guidance of T.Z. and Y.Z.; L.H., D.X. and D.C. wrote the paper with input from S.L., Z.S., E.M., J.L., T.Z. and D.R. All authors contributed to discussions of the results and the revision of the manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Degang Xie or Zhiwei Shan.

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Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Legends for Supplementary Videos 1–6, Figs. 1–8, Table 1, Notes 1–6 and refs. 1–12.

Supplementary Video 1

Motion of dislocation 1 in vacuum.

Supplementary Video 2

Motion of dislocation 1 in 2 Pa H2 atmosphere.

Supplementary Video 3

Motion of dislocation 3 in vacuum.

Supplementary Video 4

Motion of dislocation 3 in 2 Pa H2 atmosphere.

Supplementary Video 5

Motion of dislocation 2 in 2 Pa H2 atmosphere.

Supplementary Video 6

Motion of dislocation 2 in vacuum after the sample had been degassed in vacuum for ~3 h.

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Huang, L., Chen, D., Xie, D. et al. Quantitative tests revealing hydrogen-enhanced dislocation motion in α-iron. Nat. Mater. 22, 710–716 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-023-01537-w

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