Titanium resistance to deformation near the theoretical strength limit

In this paper, we studied the evolution of the compression wave in titanium films generated by femtosecond laser pulses by spectral interferometry with a picosecond resolution. At a submicron propagation length, splitting of the shock wave into an elastic and plastic shock is recorded with a compression stress of $8.4$ GPa behind the front of the elastic precursor. The corresponding value of the maximum shear stress ($2.7$ GPa) is comparable to the calculated values of the ideal strength of titanium.