High temperature nanomechanical testing

Abstract

Elevated temperature nanomechanical testing is becoming a very popular technique to unravel temperature effects on the deformation mechanisms of a number of material systems, especially in those cases where it is the only available technique for mechanical testing, like in thin-films and coatings. This chapter presents several success stories where nanoindentation and micropillar compression were applied at elevated temperature to study the temperature-dependent strength and strain rate-dependent behavior. Nevertheless, we recognize several areas which require further developments for elevated nanomechanical testing to become a widely used and robust technique: more automated approaches to continuously monitor and correct for thermal drift and more stable and longerlasting new indenter materials.