Related papers: On failure mechanisms and load-parallel cracking i…
This paper investigates the effects of plasticity on the effective fracture toughness. A layered material is considered as a modelling system. An elastic-plastic phase-field model and a surfing boundary condition are used to study how the…
We investigate the role of architected thin films in the interfacial failure properties of bi-layer composites. Our results show that, while graded structures can be used to prescribe failure at the interface, they do not offer significant…
Cavitation has long been recognized as a crucial predictor, or precursor, to the ultimate failure of various materials, ranging from ductile metals to soft and biological materials. Traditionally, cavitation in solids is defined as an…
For a comprehensive characterization of mechanical reliability of metallization layers on polymer substrates both electrical and mechanical degradation should be taken into account. Although it is evident that cracking of a conductive film…
We study experimentally the slow growth of a single crack in a fibrous material and observe stepwise growth dynamics. We model the material as a lattice where the crack is pinned by elastic traps and grows due to thermally activated stress…
Fracture growth in a material is strongly influenced by the presence of inhomogeneities, which deviate crack trajectories from rectilinearity and deeply affect failure. Increasing crack tortuosity is connected to enhancement of fracture…
In viscoelastic materials, individually short-lived bonds collectively result in a mechanical resistance which is long-lived but finite, as ultimately cracks appear. Here we provide a microscopic mechanism by which cracks emerge from the…
Liquid crystal elastomer films that morph into cones are strikingly capable lifters. Thus motivated, we combine theory, numerics, and experiments to reexamine the load-bearing capacity of conical shells. We show that a cone squashed between…
When a thin film moderately adherent to a substrate is subjected to residual stress, the cooperation between fracture and delamination leads to unusual fracture patterns, such as spirals, alleys of crescents and various types of strips, all…
We investigate numerically the failure process when two elastic media, one hard and one soft that have been glued together thus forming a common interface, are pulled apart. We present three main results: (1) The area distribution of…
Slow crack growth in a model of homogenous brittle elastic material is described as a thermal activation process where stress fluctuations allow to overcome a breaking threshold through a series of irreversible steps. We study the case of a…
Mechanical reliability plays an outsized role in determining the durability of flexible electronic devices because of the significant mechanical stresses they can experience during manufacturing and operation. These devices are typically…
We study the existence of distinct failure regimes in a model for fracture in fibrous materials. We simulate a bundle of parallel fibers under uniaxial static load and observe two different failure regimes: a catastrophic and a slowly…
We study experimentally the fracture mechanisms of a model cohesive granular medium consisting of glass beads held together by solidified polymer bridges. The elastic response of this material can be controlled by changing the cross-linking…
The growth dynamics of a single crack in a heterogeneous material under subcritical loading is an intermittent process; and many features of this dynamics have been shown to agree with simple models of thermally activated rupture. In order…
We investigate the fragmentation process of solid materials with crystalline and amorphous phases using the discrete element method. Damage initiates inside spherical samples above the contact zone in a region where the circumferential…
A continuum model of crack propagation is presented and discussed. We obtain steady state solutions with a self-consistently selected propagation velocity and shape of the crack, provided that elastodynamic and viscoelastic effects are…
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…
We study a theoretical model of mud cracks, that is, the fracture patterns resulting from the contraction with drying in a thin layer of a mixture of granules and water. In this model, we consider the slip on the bottom of this layer and…
The dynamics of a crack propagating in an elastic inhomogeneous material is investigated. The variations of the average crack velocity with the external loading are measured for a brittle rock and are shown to display two distinct regimes:…