Volume 8, Issue 4s, December 2018

Special Issue "Superplasticity and Related Phenomena"
Guest editor: Pavel Lukac

Preface

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In this special issue, we have collected the papers dedicated to Professor Oskar A. Kaibyshev who has significantly contributed to the development of basic and applied research in the field of superplasticity and related phenomena. As written by Professor Terence G. Langdon (paper # 1 in this issue), “Very large elongations may be achieved in the process known as superplasticity in which metals pull out in tension with little or no necking and exhibit failure elongations that are in excess of 400%.” Starting from the first studies by Pearson, Bochvar and Sviderskaya and other researchers, the superplasticity grew to a mature technology. Oskar Kaibyshev, with his co-workers, made outstanding contributions to the study of different aspects of this phenomenon and its applications: they studied the conditions necessary for the superplastic behavior, methods for producing fine- and ultrafine-grained materials, developed the technologies for superplastic forging, forming, diffusion bonding combined with superplastic forming etc. for industrial applications. They have developed new materials exhibiting superplastic behavior. The importance of their research results was well established for fabrication of components. Professor Kaibyshev demonstrated outstanding leadership in science. In 1985 he founded the Institute for Metals Superplasticity Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IMSP RAS) in Ufa, which at present successfully works on different fields of materials science. He and his coworkers have presented the results of their investigations in many articles and at many international conferences. Their papers were also very helpful for understanding the effects of the microstructure and experimental conditions on the high strain rate/low temperature superplasticity. His book “Sverkhplastichnost’ promyshlennykh splavov” (Superplasticity of Commercial Alloys”) published in Moscow in 1984 has become a desk book for many researchers in Russia and Russian-reading researchers abroad.

Professor Oskar Kaibyshev was confident that the international cooperation was very important. Many world-known researchers have visited IMSP RAS. I can list only a few of them: Profs. T.G. Langdon, H. Gleiter, K.A. Padmanabhan, A.K. Mukherjee, K. Tangri, etc. I also remember warmly my visits with my wife to this institute in the end of 1980-ths.

Oskar passed away in 2017. With his death I lost an excellent friend. He will be long remembered in Prague as the one who devoted his life to science.

I am grateful to Prof. R.R. Mulyukov, the Editor-in-Chief of the Letters on Materials journal and Director of IMSP RAS, for inviting me as the Guest-Editor for this special issue.

Guest-Editor,
Prof., DSc, Dr.h.c. P. Lukač,
Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic