Strain localization and damage criteria of materials and structures are commonly based on a dissipative framework and this work investigates the thermomechanical couplings accompanying the deformation micromechanisms. It is partly based on experimental data obtained previously in the laboratory by Bodelot for a A316L austenitic stainless steel polycrystal. This work takes profit of a multi-technique approach combining, in particular, in-situ kinematic and thermal fields measurements as well as Orientation Imaging Microscopy, profilometry and surface micrography. Different tools have been developed (1) to automatically identify the activated slip systems directly from the surface micrography, (2) to approach the surface emissivity field allowing an accurate determination of the thermal fields with a 30 mK precision, (3) to project raw experimental fields on the microstructure and (4) to allow the modeling of the polycrystal aggregate and its real thermomechanical boundary conditions by using a crystal plasticity framework within the Abaqus FE code. It has notably been shown that the temperature variations provides an easy and accurate estimation of the macroscopic yield stress at the specimen scale as well as the determination of the Critical Resolved Shear Stress at the intragranular scale. In addition, the local kinematic measurements allow the in-situ identification of the activated slip systems. Experimental and numerical energy balances have been conducted and a great influence of the polycrystalline heterogeneity on the energy storage mechanism has been underlined. The proposed methods would help improving physical based dissipative criteria for damage analysis
