The purpose of these investigations was to determine the effect of the strain rate on the phenomenon of a heterogeneous plastic deformation of the Portevin-Le Chatelier type while testing free compression of CuZn30 single crystals with a crystallographic orientation of [139] at 300°C. Moreover, the relations between the work-hardening curve s -e displaying the PLC effect and the characteristics of the signals of the acoustic emission generated in the uniaxial-compression test were determined. It was found that the process of plastic deformation of the tested single crystals in the analyzed range of the frequencies up to 35 kHz generates differentiated sources of acoustic-energy emission, mainly the impulsive emission generated by signal events, correlated with the oscillations of the stresses on the work-hardening curves s -e. The strain rate mainly causes the changes in the intensity of the oscillation typical for the PLC effect. Keywords: plastic strain, Portevin-Le Chatelier effect (PLC), single crystals, copper alloys, compression test, acoustic emission (AE) Namen raziskav je bil ugotoviti vpliv hitrosti deformiranja pri preizkusu stiskanja monokristalov CuZn30 s kristalografsko orientacijo [139] pri 300°C na pojav heterogene plasti~ne deformacije vrste Portevin-Le Chatelier. Poleg tega so bile ugotovljene {e odvisnosti med krivuljo deformacijskega utrjevanja s -e, ki ka`e pojav PLC, in zna~ilnostmi signalov akusti~ne emisije pri enoosnem tla~nem preizkusu. Ugotovljeno je, da proces plasti~ne deformacije preizku{anih kristalov v analiziranem podro~ju frekvenc do 35 kHz proizvaja diferencirane vire emisije akusti~ne energije, predvsem impulzivne emisije signalov, ki se skladajo z oscilacijo napetosti na krivulji deformacijskega utrjevanja s -e. Hitrost deformacije se ka`e predvsem v spremembi intenzitete oscilacij, zna~ilnih za PLC-pojav. Klju~ne besede: plasti~na deformacija, Portevin-Le Chatelierov pojav (PLC), monokristali, zlitine bakra, tla~ni preizkus, akusti~na emisija (AE)