Related papers: Elastic forces that do no work and the dynamics of…
Cracks, the major vehicle for material failure, tend to accelerate to high velocities in brittle materials. In three-dimensions, cracks generically undergo a micro-branching instability at about 40% of their sonic limiting velocity. Recent…
The dynamics of rapid brittle cracks is commonly studied in the framework of linear elastic fracture mechanics where nonlinearities are neglected. However, recent experimental and theoretical work demonstrated explicitly the importance of…
While we fundamentally understand the dynamics of 'simple' cracks propagating in brittle solids within perfect (homogeneous) materials, we do not understand how paths of moving cracks are determined. We experimentally study strongly…
The failure of materials and interfaces is mediated by cracks, nearly singular dissipative structures that propagate at velocities approaching the speed of sound. Crack initiation and subsequent propagation -- the dynamic process of…
A dynamic crack tip equation of motion is proposed based on the autonomy of the near-tip nonlinear zone of scale $\ell_{nl}$, symmetry principles, causality and scaling arguments. Causality implies that the asymptotic linear-elastic fields…
The effects of purely elastic collisions on the dynamics of heavy inertial particles is investigated in a three-dimensional random incompressible flow. It is shown that the statistical properties of inter-particle separations and relative…
A dynamic crack will travel in a straight path up to a material-dependent critical speed beyond which its path becomes erratic. Predicting this critical speed and discovering the origin of this instability are two outstanding problems in…
A mechanical system is presented exhibiting a non-deterministic singularity, that is, a point in an otherwise deterministic system where forward time trajectories become non-unique. A Coulomb friction force applies linear and angular forces…
The problem of finding what direction cracks should move is not completely solved. A commonly accepted way to predict crack directions is by computing the density of elastic potential energy stored well away from the crack tip, and finding…
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…
Motivated by recent experiments, we present a study of the dynamics of cracks in thin sheets. While the equations of elasticity for thin plates are well known, there remains the question of path selection for a propagating crack. We invoke…
We consider a one dimensional elastic string as a set of massless beads interacting through springs characterized by anisotropic elastic constants. The string, driven by an external force, moves in a medium with quenched disorder. We…
Cracks are the major vehicle for material failure, and often exhibit rather complex dynamics. The laws that govern their motion have remained an object of constant study for nearly a century. The simplest kind of dynamic crack is a single…
We study the dynamics of three elastic particles in a finite interval where two light particles are separated by a heavy ``piston''. The piston undergoes surprisingly complex motion that is oscillatory at short time scales but seemingly…
We study, both analytically and numerically, the dynamics of elastic boundaries such as crack fronts in fracture and surfaces of contact in solid on solid friction. The elastic waves in the solid give rise to kinks that move with a…
Crack-like objects that propagate along frictional interfaces, i.e.~frictional shear cracks, play a major role in a broad range of frictional phenomena. Such frictional cracks are commonly assumed to feature the universal square root…
We study the stability and roughness of propagating cracks in heterogeneous brittle two-dimensional elastic materials. We begin by deriving an equation of motion describing the dynamics of such a crack in the framework of Linear Elastic…
We study how the loading rate, specimen geometry and microstructural texture select the dynamics of a crack moving through an heterogeneous elastic material in the quasi-static approximation. We find a transition, fully controlled by two…
Crack growth is the basic mechanism leading to the failure of brittle materials. Engineering addresses this problem within the framework of continuum mechanics, which links deterministically the crack motion to the applied loading. Such an…
The dynamics of tensile crack fronts restricted to advance in a plane are studied. In an ideal linear elastic medium, a propagating mode along the crack front with a velocity slightly less than the Rayleigh wave velocity, is found to exist.…