Why plastic deformation occurs at stresses that are much smaller than the theoretical strength of perfect crystals?
Force needed for plastic deformation is much smaller than the force needed to break allbonds within the slip plane. This is where dislocations play a significant role to explain thisobservation. To cause large movement in the slip plane is not necessary to break all bonds ofthe particular plane but rather involve large number of dislocations or you can think of aspropagation of a dislocation.