Elastic engineering strain has been regarded as a low-cost and continuously variable manner for altering the physical and chemical properties of materials, and it becomes even more important at low-dimensionality because at micro/nanoscale, materials/structures can usually bear exceptionally high elastic strains before failure. The elastic strain effects are therefore greatly magnified in micro/nanoscale structures and should be of great potential in the design of novel functional devices. The purpose of this overview is to present a summary of our recently progress in the energy band engineering of elastically bent ZnO micro/nanowires. First, we present the electronic and mechanical coupling effect in bent ZnO nanowires. Second, we summary the bending strain gradient effect on the near-band-edge (NBE) emission photon energy of bent ZnO micro/nanowires. Third, we show that the strain can induce exciton fine-structure splitting and shift in ZnO microwires. Our recent progresses illustrate that the electronic band structure of ZnO micro/nanowires can be dramatically tuned by elastic strain engineering, and point to potential future applications based on the elastic strain engineering of ZnO micro/nanowires.

The formation of misfit dislocations is an important issue for the performance of heteroepitaxial micro- and optoelectronic devices. We analyze three approaches that quantify the stability of misfit dislocations in axial-heteroepitaxial nanowires with respect to applicability and predictions of critical nanowire dimensions. The “nanoheteroepitaxy” approach of Zubia and Hersee proves suitable for determination of strain partitioning in the presence of an elastic mismatch. Concerning the critical thickness and diameter however the descriptions of Ertekin et al. and Glas respectively yield more reliable results, owing to the consideration of the total coherent and dislocation related energies plus the residual strain energy. In contrast to the model of Ertekin et al., which refers to infinitely long nanowires, the other two mentioned approaches allow predictions of the critical thickness of mismatched deposits on the nanowire axial face.

The advance in Electron Backscatter Diffraction known as High Resolution EBSD has permitted the strain tensor components and neighbour disorientation measurements to be mapped at resolutions better than 2 parts in 10000. Following earlier research into this technique which was focused on verifying the sensitivity and accuracy of the measurements, recent studies have involved investigations on semiconductor and metallic polycrystalline materials. In particular observations of localized regions where residual strains exceeded the macroscopic yield stress have been thoroughly investigated to eliminate experimental error as a possible explanation. No such cause was found. Strain measurements on polycrystalline steels in uniaxial tension and during thermal stress relieving thermal treatment have also been carried out. Maps of the strain distribution during elastic loading and early stages of plastic flow showed hot spots of high strain as in the static tests but overall the measured elastic strain was equal to the applied strain.