A single ion impact on a crystalline metal may cause the plastic flow of tens of thousands of atoms in a pulse lasting less than a nanosecond. In a very thin material, pulsed plastic flow can produce a hole. When pulsed plastic flow occurs at a free surface, it can cause the formation of a crater and ejection of material onto the surface.
Plastic flow can also cause the annihilation of preexisting craters or change surface roughness.
When plastic flow occurs at confined interfaces, it can cause large deformations. Pulsed plastic flow in buried layers breaks such layers into separated particles. For some time, scientists have known about irradiation-induced plastic flow of amorphous alloys, but all models for the process have assumed that the lack of a crystal structure was a key requirement. Our work demonstrates that this is not true. Irradiation-induced plastic flow is driven by the high energy density within the displacement cascade produced by an ion impact.