Stress-strain rate dependence of homogeneous flow in metallic glasses

Abstract The stress dependence of the steady state homogeneous plastic flow rate in amorphous Pd82Si18 has been measured over a large stress range and shown to obey a hyperbolic sine relation. A direct consequence of this relation is a transition from linear, Newtonian viscous flow to a non-linear regime, which we observed at τ ~ 300 MPa. The sheared volume is found to be 48 A3. The apparently conflicting literature data for strain rate sensitivity are reconciled with each other and with this new data by taking into account the stress range of the tests.