1. Understanding and modelling of the two-way relationship between the structure of metals at nano/ micro/ mesoscale and the mechanical behaviour at macro-scale.
"Structure" is a general term including dislocation patterns, microstructure, grain structure, crystallographic texture and damage. "Mechanical Behaviour" includes flow stress, work hardening and work softening, effects of strain path changes, ductile fracture and plastic anisotropy. Attention must be given to the coupling between the length scales. The latter is believed to influence or being influenced by a lot of phenomena, of which the following will be taken into account: dislocation, mechanical twinning, the competition between these two, heterogeneous distribution of stress and strain, size effects and finally also comparing behaviour at low and very high strain rates.
2. Development of models for the mechanical behaviour of the material at macro-scale to be used in finite element simulations at engineering scale.
An essential aspect is the development of appropriate schemes for the identification of the parameters of these macro-scale models on the basis of predictions made by multilevel-models. The latter results from the achievement of the previous objective. Special emphasis will be given on numerical stability and efficiency of the finite element codes for the engineering scale after implementation of the macro-scale models, accounting for the need of inorporating physical length scales.