It was suggested that the size effect in plastic bending of thin crystalline strips was due to bowing of dislocations that nucleate at the free surface and glide towards the neutral plane. The approach was an application of the continuum dislocation-based model, which considers fields of curved dislocations endowed with line tension and which was embedded in a rigorous continuum mechanics framework. The model equations were evaluated and the results were compared with the previous version of the model where pre-existing straight dislocations were assumed in the strip.

Bending of Thin Crystalline Strips - Comparison of Continuum Dislocation-Based Models. R.Sedláček: Materials Science and Engineering A, 2005, 400-401, 439-42