Ceramic materials with chemical inertness, high strength and tunable microstructures have been widely employed in structural components and functional devices. However, the brittle behavior of ceramics hinders their applications. Different from most brittle ceramics, strontium titanate (STO) with perovskite structure exhibits a spectacular ductile-to-brittle-to-ductile transition (DBDT) behavior over a wide temperature range. A surprising level of plastic strain (7%) can be achieved under compression at room temperature in single crystal STO. This report reviews recent studies on the mechanical behavior of STO over a wide temperature range and highlights some future works that can be done to deepen the understanding of its deformation mechanism and further improve the plasticity.  

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