Atomistic simulations of nanoindentation in the presence of vacancies

This paper investigates the effect of vacancies on dislocation nucleation in iron by means of molecular dynamics atomistic simulations at low temperatures. Increasing the vacancy concentration resulted in a decrease in the load at the onset of plasticity following a power law relationship. Dislocations did not nucleate at a vacancy in these simulations. This suggests that vacancies, even without diffusing within the solid, may impact experimental observations of dislocation nucleation using nanoindentation.