Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 February 2011
A new rate-independent constitutive model for plastic deformation of crystalline materials deforming by slip and twinning has been formulated, and implemented in a finite-element program. We have simulated three different structural levels by choosing representative volume elements (RVEs) as (i) a small part of a single crystal for the analysis of the heterogeneity of plastic deformation in single crystals, (ii) a whole single crystal for polycrystal simulations, and (iii) a group of crystals for a Taylor-type model of polycrystals. We show that the predictions for the texture and stress-strain response from the model are in reasonably good agreement with experiments in plane-strain compression for a different single crystal and polycrystalline f.c.c, materials.