The strength of a material is dependent on how easily dislocations in its crystal lattice can be propagated. These dislocations create stress fields within the material depending on their character. When solute atoms are introduced, local stress fields are formed that interact with those of the dislocations, impeding their motion and causing an increase in the yield stress of the material, which means an increase in strength of the material. This gain is a result of both lattice distortion and the modulus effect.
When solute and solvent atoms differ in size, local stress fields are created that can attract or repel dislocations in their vicinity. This is known as the size effect. By relieving tensile or compressive strain in the lattice, the solute size mismatch can put the dislocation in a lower energy state. In substitutional solid solutions, these stress fields are spherically symmetric, meaning they have no shear stress component. As such, substitutional solute atoms do not interact with the shear stress fields characteristic of screw dislocations. Conversely, in interstitial solid solutions, solute atoms cause a tetragonal distortion, generating a shear field that can interact with edge, screw, and mixed dislocations. The attraction or repulsion of the dislocation to the solute atom depends on whether the atom sits above or below the slip plane. For example, consider an edge dislocation encountering a smaller solute atom above its slip plane. In this case, the interaction energy is negative, resulting in attraction of the dislocation to the solute. This is due to the reduced dislocation energy by the compressed volume lying above the dislocation core. If the solute atom were positioned below the slip plane, the dislocation would be repelled by the solute. However, the overall interaction energy between an edge dislocation and a smaller solute is negative because the dislocation spends more time at sites with attractive energy. This is also true for solute atom with size greater than the solvent atom. Thus, the interaction energy dictated by the size effect is generally negative. 
The elastic modulus of the solute atom can also determine the extent of strengthening. For a “soft” solute with elastic modulus lower than that of the solvent, the interaction energy due to modulus mismatch (U) is negative, which reinforce the size interaction energy (U). In contrast, U is positive for a “hard” solute, which results in lower total interaction energy than a soft atom. Even though the interaction force is negative (attractive) in both cases when the dislocation is approaching the solute. The maximum force (F) necessary to tear dislocation away from the lowest energy state (i.e. the solute atom) is greater for the soft solute than the hard one. As a result, a soft solute will strengthen a crystal more than a hard solute due to the synergistic strengthening by combining both size and modulus effects. 
The elastic interaction effects (i.e. size and modulus effects) dominate solid-solution strengthening for most crystalline materials. However, other effects, including charge and stacking fault effects, may also play a role. For ionic solids where electrostatic interaction dictates bond strength, charge effect is also important. For example, addition of divalent ion to a monovalent material may strengthen the electrostatic interaction between the solute and the charged matrix atoms that comprise a dislocation. However, this strengthening is to a less extent than the elastic strengthening effects. For materials containing a higher density of stacking faults, solute atoms may interact with the stacking faults either attractively or repulsively. This lowers the stacking fault energy, leading to repulsion of the partial dislocations, which thus makes the material stronger. 
Surface carburizing, or case hardening, is one example of solid solution strengthening in which the density of solute carbon atoms is increased close to the surface of the steel, resulting in a gradient of carbon atoms throughout the material. This provides superior mechanical properties to the surface of the steel without having to use a higher-cost material for the component.