Abstract: An investigation has been made of the disloca- tion distribution and dislocation free zone near the crack tip in bulk Fe-3% Si single crystal during deformation in SEM.It has been found that a number of dislocations were emitted from the crack tip during deformation.After that,the dislocations moved rapidly away from the crack tip,which indi- cated that they were strongly repelled by the stress field at the crack tip.Between the crack tip and the plastic zone there is a region of dislocation-free, which is referred to as dislocation-free zone (DFZ). The length of DFZs is roughly estimated 100 μm which is much longer than that found in thin foil specimen.The variation of dislocation density as a function of the distance from the crack tip was measured,which showed that the dislocations are inversely piled up in the plastic zone.The length of DFZs increased with both the length of pre-crack and the amplitude of applied stress.

Key words: dislocation, crack tip, DFZ, Fe-3%Si single crystal