Nodal effects in dislocation mobility

We show that, contrary to the prevailing perception, dislocations can become more mobile by zipping together to form junctions. In a series of direct atomistic simulations, the critical stress to move a junction network in a {110} plane of bcc molybdenum is found to be always smaller (similar to50%) than that required to move isolated dislocations. Our data support a previously proposed hypothesis about the nature of anomalous slip in bcc transition metals, yet offer a different atomistic mechanism for conservative motion of screw dislocation networks. The same data suggest a hierarchy of motion mechanisms in which lower-dimensional crystal imperfections control the rate of sliding along the low-angle twist boundaries.