ABSTRACT
Solid solution hardening is a typical hardening behavior observed commonly in all classes of metallic alloy systems including off-stoichiometric intermetallic compounds. The origin of solid solution hardening is usually ascribed to the interaction between a dislocation and impurities contained in a solid solution that act as obstacles to a moving dislocation. Besides substitutional and interstitial foreign elements, one may include even a vacancy, a forest dislocation, and other defects as impurities that have the potential to cause hardening. The magnitude and extension of the interaction force depend on the kind of impurities. The primary mission of the study of solid solution hardening is to clarify the elementary interaction mechanism and to estimate the magnitude of the interaction force for each obstacle on the basis of dislocation theory.
