Anisotropic stress–strain response and microstructure evolution of textured α-uranium

The deformation behavior of wrought α-uranium is studied using electron backscattered diffraction and crystal plasticity modeling. We report stress–strain response and texture evolution for 12 different cases corresponding to tension and compression tests performed on three different initial textures: straight-rolled, clock-rolled and swaged α-uranium. It is seen that the response of α-uranium is highly anisotropic owing to its low-symmetry orthorhombic crystal structure and limited number of slip/twin systems. For modeling this complex system, we adapt a multiscale dislocation-based hardening law developed earlier for hexagonal metals and implement it within a viscoplastic self-consistent homogenization scheme. This hardening law performs well in capturing the anisotropic strain hardening and the texture evolution in all studied samples. Comparisons of simulations and experiments allow us to infer basic information concerning the various slip and twin mechanisms, their interactions, and their role on strain hardening and texture evolution in α-uranium.