Related papers: Avalanches in Breakdown and Fracture Processes

The distribution of the magnitudes of damage avalanches during a failure process typically follows a power law. When these avalanches are recorded close to the point at which the system fails catastrophically, we find that the power law has…

We review limiting models for fracture in bundles of fibers, with statistically distributed thresholds for breakdown of individual fibers. During the breakdown process, avalanches consisting of simultaneous rupture of several fibers occur,…

Based on a theoretical model for opinion spreading on a network, through avalanches, the effect of external field is now considered, by using methods from non-equilibrium statistical mechanics. The original part contains the implementation…

We introduce a simple model for the size distribution of avalanches based on the idea that the front of an avalanche can be described by a directed random walk. The model captures some of the qualitative features of earthquakes, avalanches…

In this thesis I discuss analytical approaches to disordered systems using field theory. Disordered systems are characterized by a random energy landscape due to heterogeneities, which remains fixed on the time scales of the phenomena…

Multi-phase materials, such as composite materials, exhibit multiple competing failure mechanisms during the growth of a macroscopic defect. For the simulation of the overall fracture process in such materials, we develop a two-phase spring…

The instability introduced in a large scale-free network by the triggering of node-breaking avalanches is analyzed using the fiber-bundle model as conceptual framework. We found, by measuring the size of the giant component, the avalanche…

Avalanche-like plastic bursts in crystalline materials follow power law statistics, but the scaling exponents and cutoff parameters vary widely in the literature ($\alpha$ ranging from 1 to 2.2), hindering predictive modeling. Since…

Avalanches of electrochemical activity in brain networks have been empirically reported to obey scale-invariant behavior --characterized by power-law distributions up to some upper cut-off-- both in vitro and in vivo. Elucidating whether…

We investigate by means of computer simulations the effect of structural disorder on the statistics of cracking for a thin layer of material under uniform and isotropic drying. The layer is discretized into a triangular lattice of springs.…

Power-law-shaped avalanche-size distributions are widely used to probe for critical behavior in many different systems, particularly in neural networks. The definition of avalanche is ambiguous. Usually, theoretical avalanches are defined…

As shown recently (arXiv:0801.3056), several types of neuronal complex networks involving non-linear integration-and-fire dynamics exhibit an abrupt activation along their transient regime. Interestingly, such an avalanche of activation has…

A damped chain of particles with harmonic nearest-neighbor interactions in a spatially periodic, piecewise harmonic potential (Frenkel-Kontorova model) is studied numerically. One end of the chain is pulled slowly which acts as a weak…

We investigate statistics and scaling laws of avalanches in two-dimensional frictional particles by numerical simulations. We find that the critical exponent for avalanche size distributions is governed by microscopic friction between the…

In this chapter, we discuss avalanches in glasses and disordered systems, and the macroscopic dynamical behavior that they mediate. We briefly review three classes of systems where avalanches are observed: depinning transition of disordered…

Combining X-ray tomography with simultaneous shear force measurement, we investigate shear-induced granular avalanches using spherical particles with different surface roughness. We find that systems consisting of particles with large…

Fiber bundles with statistically distributed thresholds for breakdown of individual fibers are interesting models of the static and dynamics of failures in materials under stress. They can be analyzed to an extent that is not possible for…

Numerous systems ranging from deformation of materials to earthquakes exhibit bursty dynamics, which consist of a sequence of events with a broad event size distribution. Very often these events are observed to be temporally correlated or…

Crackling noise, which occurs in a wide range of situations, is characterized by discrete events of various sizes, often correlated in the form of avalanches. We report experimental evidence that the mechanical response of knitted fabric…

We analyze the scaling of the crack roughness and of avalanche precursors in the two dimensional random fuse model by numerical simulations, employing large system sizes and extensive sample averaging. We find that the crack roughness…