Ultrafine austenite-ferrite duplex medium Mn steels often show a discontinuous yielding phenomenon, which is not commonly observed in other composite-like multiphase materials. The underlying dislocation-based mechanisms are not understood. Here we show that medium Mn steels with an austenite matrix (austenite fraction ∼65 vol%) can exhibit pronounced discontinuous yielding. A combination of multiple in situ characterization techniques from macroscopic (a few millimeters) down to nanoscopic scale (below 100 nm) is utilized to investigate this phenomenon. We observe that both austenite and ferrite are plastically deformed before the macroscopic yield point. In this microplastic regime, plastic deformation starts in the austenite phase before ferrite yields. The austenite-ferrite interfaces act as preferable nucleation sites for new partial dislocations in austenite and for full dislocations in ferrite. The large total interface area, caused by the submicron grain size, can provide a high density of dislocation sources and lead to a rapid increase of mobile dislocations, which is believed to be the major reason accounting for discontinuous yielding in such steels. We simultaneously study the Lüders banding behavior and the local deformation-induced martensite forming inside the Lüders bands. We find that grain size and the austenite stability against deformation-driven martensite formation are two important microstructural factors controlling the Lüders band characteristics in terms of the number of band nucleation sites and their propagation velocity. These factors thus govern the early yielding stages of medium Mn steels, due to their crucial influence on mobile dislocation generations and local work hardening.

In this study, we present a general methodology that combines the reliability theory with physics of failure for reliability prediction of an LED driver. More specifically, an integrated LED lamp, which includes an LED light source with statistical distribution of luminous flux, and a driver with a few critical components, is considered. The Wiener process is introduced to describe the randomness of lumen depreciation. The driver's survival probability is described using a general Markov Chain method. The system compact thermal model (physics of failure model) is developed to couple with the reliability methods used. Two scenarios are studied: Scenario S1 considers constant driver's operation temperature, while Scenario S2 considers driver's temperature rise due to lumen depreciation. It has been found that the wide life distribution of LEDs will lead to a large range of the driver's survival probability. The proposed analysis provides a general approach for an electronic system to integrate the reliability method with physics models.

This chapter investigates the reliability of the integrated LED lamps with electrolytic capacitor-less LED drivers. Firstly, the impact of the interaction between the degradations of the LED light source and the driver on the lumen depreciation is studied. The electronic-thermal simulation was carried out to obtain the history of temperatures of LED and driver, the driver’s output current, and the luminous flux considering the variations of temperature and current throughout the operation life. It is found that the ultimate lamp’s lifetime is significantly less than the individual lifetimes of the preselected LED and driver. It is concluded that it is necessary to apply the electronic-thermal simulations to predict the lifetime of LED lamps when driver’s lifetime is comparable to the LED’s lifetime. Secondly, this chapter focuses on predicting the catastrophic failure of an electrolytic capacitor-free LED driver during the lumen depreciation process. Electronic-thermal simulations are utilized to obtain the lamp’s dynamic history of temperature and electrical current for two distinct modes: constant current mode (CCM) and the constant optical output (CLO) mode, respectively. A fault tree method is applied to calculate the system’s MTTF, and the LED’s lifetime also is calculated. The CLO mode increases the LED’s current exponentially to maintain the constant light output. As a result, junction temperatures of LEDs, MOSFET, and diode rise significantly, leading a shorter lifetime and MTTF. Compare with the current of the MOSFET, the increased junction temperature has larger effects on the failure rate. The MOSFET contributes more to the driver’s failure rate than the diode. For the CCM mode, junction temperatures increase slightly and have a little shorter lifetime and MTTF.