Fig. 2

The results of strain and order mapping during in situ deformation. a–e Strain maps at increasing deformation steps. The scale bar is 150 nm. The top row is strain in the tensile direction, the middle row is strain perpendicular to the tensile direction, and the bottom row of strain maps is shear. By step d plastic strain has developed in the tensile direction. f Load-displacement plot acquired from the in situ TEM mechanical testing holder. The blue solid line is the data acquired, with the displacements corresponding to the different map acquisitions a–e marked with red squares. The orange dashed line is the least squares fit to the elastic regime, while the yellow dashed line corresponds to the plastic region. The change in slope between c, d is indicative of plastic deformation. The sample fractured before e. The drift in the plot corresponding to the hold times during the NBED acquisitions at the 10, 20, and 30 nm steps has been removed. g–k Maps showing local order at increasing deformation steps as measured from the diffraction patterns. The top row corresponds to two-fold symmetry, while the bottom row corresponds to four-fold symmetry. The scale corresponds to the normalized Fourier coefficients (NFC). l A plot showing the relative mean amount of two-fold (blue circle) and four-fold (green square) order in the corresponding areas in g at successive deformations. These areas correspond to 3450 diffraction patterns. The plot shows roughly a 2–3% reduction order relative to the maximum over the entire area