Strain Tensors at the Atomic Scale

Almansi and Green strain tensors are developed for use in large deformation molecular dynamics/statics simulations that employ Embedded Atom Method (EAM) potentials for metals. The strain tensors are formulated with respect to the deformation gradient. A scalar potential function is used with a weighting function that is dependent upon a cutoff radius for the deformation gradient. For a homogeneous or inhomogeneous deformation, a cutoff distance of one lattice parameter can be used to approximate local strain level. Inhomogeneous deformation reveals different results for Almansi and Green strain tensors indicating that the small strain assumption cannot be used to determine large atomic strains.