Please consider attending the following: MATERIALS ENGINEERING SEMINAR "Micromechanical Analysis and Characterization of Materials with Spatially Distinct Microstructural Features" By Raheleh Mohammad Rahimi Purdue MSE Ph.D. Final Exam Advisor: Professor David F. Bahr ABSTRACT Correlations between materials microstructural properties and mechanical behavior are important for materials development. As materials characterization methods have been restricted to instrument accessibility, sample dimensions and economical aspects, developing functional techniques in order to obtain better understanding of materials behavior in micro and nano scale is crucial. Procedures for assessing and interpreting the mechanical responses at small scales, combined with investigating the microstructure are considered as significant steps to design and develop the effective frameworks for evaluating bulk properties. This research demonstrates that how fundamental understanding of microstructures can assist interpreting of mechanical performance of bulk materials. Testing of materials at small scales is very important because the mechanical failure of any bulk material starts with the formation, extension, or local accumulation of initially small defects, leading finally to a fracture. Thus, any bulk material profits from an in-depth understanding of its deformation and mechanical phenomena at the nano- and micrometer length scale. This thesis shows how the micro constituents' interactions and grain boundaries reactions to dislocations in alloys and thin films contribute to understanding material flow behavior and differences in the mechanical properties of these materials in a wide range of material systems with variations in appropriate sizes which need to be probed. Among other things, this work shows that sources of variation can be specified and quantified as predictive tools for designing materials. The strength and strain hardening of martensite and ferrite in a dual phase steel with a grain size less than 5 μm were determined using an inverse technique. The yield strengths of the ferrite and martensite phases are calculated as 370 MPa and 950 MPa respectively. The calculated hardening exponent of the alloy was exactly same as tensile test result (0.11). The constrain phenomena was obviously effective in deformation of this elastic-plastic alloy. Also the differences in hardness and pop-in behavior were used to understand of the influences of different types of grain boundaries, high density dislocations, and twins in Al thin films before and after plasticity. Date: Friday, October 4, 2019 Time: 1:30 P.M. Place: HAMP 2118