Related papers: A statistical mechanics framework for polymer chai…
Elastomers are used in a wide range of applications because of their large strain to failure, low density, and tailorable stiffness and toughness. The mechanical behavior of elastomers derives mainly from the entropic elasticity of the…
The mechanics of single-chain stretching and rupture are central to understanding the resilience of biological polymers and designing strong and tough soft materials such as double-network gels and multi-network elastomers. In this work, we…
A fundamental theory is presented for the mechanical response of polymer networks undergoing large deformation which seamlessly integrates statistical mechanical principles with macroscopic thermodynamic constitutive theory. Our formulation…
The stretching response of polymer chains fundamentally determines the mechanical properties of polymer networks. In this Letter, we develop a statistical mechanics model that incorporates both bond stretching and bond angle deformation,…
This paper develops a damage model for unfilled cross-linked rubbers based on the concept of scission of polymer chains. The model is built up on the well-known Gent elastic potential complemented by a kinetic equation describing effects of…
This paper develops a damage model for unfilled cross-linked rubbers based on the concept of scission of polymer chains. The model is built up on the well-known Gent elastic potential complemented by a kinetic equation describing effects of…
Analytical relations for the mechanical response of single polymer chains are valuable for modeling purposes, on both the molecular and the continuum scale. These relations can be obtained using statistical thermodynamics and an idealized…
The fracture simulation of random particle reinforced composite structures remains a challenge. Current techniques either assumed a homogeneous model, ignoring the microstructure characteristics of composite structures, or considered a…
Materials with network-like microstructure, including polymers, are the backbone for many natural and human-made materials such as gels, biological tissues, metamaterials, and rubbers. Fracture processes in these networked materials are…
The breakage of a polymer chain of segments, coupled by anharmonic bonds with applied constant external tensile force is studied by means of Molecular Dynamics simulation. We show that the mean life time of the chain becomes progressively…
It is common to study polymer physics through the use of idealized single-chain models, and the most popular of these is the freely jointed chain model. In certain thermodynamic ensembles, statistical mechanical treatment of this model is…
Disorder and long-range interactions are two of the key components that make material failure an interesting playfield for the application of statistical mechanics. The cornerstone in this respect has been lattice models of the fracture in…
The freely jointed chain is often applied to model the thermodynamics of single polymer chains, but the traditional formulation of the model lacks internal energy changes due to bond stretching. For this reason, the extensible freely…
This study aims to unravel the micro-mechanical underpinnings of the emergence of the fractocohesive length scale as a central concept in modern fracture mechanics. A thermodynamically consistent damage and fracture model for elastomers is…
We introduce a simple theoretical model, the Freely Jointed Chain with quenched hinges (qFJC), which captures the quenched disorder in the local bending stiffness of the polymer. In this article, we analyze the tensile elasticity of the…
We propose a physics and chemistry-based constitutive framework to predict the stress responses of thermo-chemically aged elastomers and capture their brittle failure using the phase-field approach. High-temperature aging in the presence of…
Polymer networks formed by cross linking flexible polymer chains are ubiquitous in many natural and synthetic soft-matter systems. Current micromechanics models generally do not account for excluded volume interactions except, for instance,…
Entanglement of polymer chains is ubiquitous in elastomers, gels, and biological tissues. While the effects of chain entanglement on elasticity and viscoelasticity of polymer networks have been intensively studied, it remains elusive how…
Predicting the macroscopic mechanical behavior of polymeric materials from the micro-structural features has remained a challenge for decades. Existing theoretical models often fail to accurately capture the experimental data, due to…
A micromechanically motivated phase-field damage model is proposed to investigate the fracture behaviour in crosslinked polyurethane adhesive. The crosslinked polyurethane adhesive typically show viscoelastic behaviour with geometric…