Related papers: Microbranching in mode-I fracture using large scal…
We address the velocity fluctuations of fastly moving cracks in stressed materials. One possible mechanism for such fluctuations is the interaction of the main crack with micro cracks (irrespective whether these are existing material…
We present a stochastic modeling framework for atomistic propagation of a Mode I surface crack, with atoms interacting according to the Lennard-Jones interatomic potential at zero temperature. Specifically, we invoke the Cauchy-Born rule…
Fracture is the ultimate source of failure of amorphous carbon (a-C) films, however it is challenging to measure fracture properties of a-C from nano-indentation tests and results of reported experiments are not consistent. Here, we use…
We review microstructural fracture growth models suitable for the study of hydraulic fracture processes in disordered porous materials and present some basic results. It is shown that microstructural models exhibit certain similarities to…
The method of iterated conformal maps is developed for quasi-static fracture of brittle materials, for all modes of fracture. Previous theory, that was relevant for mode III only, is extended here to mode I and II. The latter require…
The problem of dynamic symmetric branching of an initial single brittle crack propagating at a given speed under plane loading conditions is studied within a continuum mechanics approach. Griffith's energy criterion and the principle of…
Dynamic crack propagation drives catastrophic solid failures. In many amorphous brittle materials, sufficiently fast crack growth involves small-scale, high-frequency microcracking damage localized near the crack tip. The ultra-fast…
Dynamic fracture experiments were performed in PMMA over a wide range of velocities and reveal that the fracture energy exhibits an abrupt 3-folds increase from its value at crack initiation at a well-defined critical velocity, below the…
This study investigates the mode I intra-laminar fracture and size effect in Discontinuous Fiber Composites (DFCs). Towards this goal, the results of fracture tests on geometrically-scaled Single Edge Notch Tension (SENT) specimens are…
Differential shrinkage in particulate quasi-brittle materials causes microcracking which reduces durability in these materials by increasing their mass transport properties. A hydro-mechanical three-dimensional periodic network approach was…
We propose a theoretical model for branching instabilities in 2-dimensional fracture, offering predictions for when crack branching occurs, how multiple cracks develop, and what is the geometry of multiple branches. The model is based on…
We introduce a model for the dynamics of mud cracking in the limit of of extremely thin layers. In this model the growth of fracture proceeds by selecting the part of the material with the smallest (quenched) breaking threshold. In…
Brittle fracturing of materials is common in natural and industrial processes over a variety of length scales. Knowledge of individual particle dynamics is vital to obtain deeper insight into the atomistic processes governing crack…
We employ a recently developed model that allows the study of two-dimensional brittle crack propagation under fixed grip boundary conditions. The crack development highlights the importance of voids which appear ahead of the crack as…
Predicting when rupture occurs or cracks progress is a major challenge in numerous elds of industrial, societal and geophysical importance. It remains largely unsolved: Stress enhancement at cracks and defects, indeed, makes the macroscale…
We studied the low speed fracture regime (0.1mm/s - 1nm/s) in different glassy materials (soda-lime glass, glass-ceramics) with variable but controlled length scale of heterogeneity. The chosen mechanical system enabled us to work in pure…
Mixed mode (I+III) loading induces segmented crack front \'echelon structures connected by steps. We study this instability in a highly deformable, strain-hardening material. We find that \'echelons develop beyond a finite, size-independent…
A planar crack generically segments into an array of "daughter cracks" shaped as tilted facets when loaded with both a tensile stress normal to the crack plane (mode I) and a shear stress parallel to the crack front (mode III). We…
We generalize lattice models of brittle fracture to arbitrary nonlinear force laws and study the existence of arrested semi-infinite cracks. Unlike what is seen in the discontinuous case studied to date, the range in driving displacement…
Extreme mechanical processes such as strong lattice distortion and bond breakage during fracture are ubiquitous in nature and engineering, which often lead to catastrophic failure of structures. However, understanding the nucleation and…