  The effect of a local shear transformation on plastic deformation of a
three-dimensional amorphous solid is studied using molecular dynamics
simulations. We consider a spherical inclusion, which is gradually transformed
into an ellipsoid of the same volume and then converted back into the sphere.
It is shown that at sufficiently large strain amplitudes, the deformation of
the material involves localized plastic events that were identified based on
the relative displacement of atoms before and after the shear transformation.
We found that the density profiles of cage jumps decay away from the inclusion,
which correlates well with the radial dependence of the local deformation of
the material. At the same strain amplitude, the plastic deformation becomes
more pronounced in the cases of weakly damped dynamics or large time scales of
the shear transformation.
