Plastic Deformation in Disordered Solids: The State of the Art and Unresolved Problems

Crystalline materials are deformed plastically through crystallographic mechanisms based on the lattice’s periodicity. However, plasticity of disordered solids can’t be described in these terms due to an absence of regular lattices. To find the best way of the description of plastic response for disordered solids (DSs) became a serious challenge for material science and solid-state physics. This paper discusses current views on mechanism of plastic deformation in DSs and touches some problems in the field. It is broadly accepted now that one, common mechanism of plasticity operates in all DSs, independent on their chemical nature and interaction potentials. Such mechanism is dictated by the structural disorder of glasses. Many details of the mechanism are not well understood yet. Important features of the mechanism are discussed in this paper, and several problems, which do not permit the field to develop further successfully are considered.