Photonics and fracture toughness of heterogeneous composite materials.

ABSTRACT: Fracture toughness measures the resistance of a material to fracture. This fundamental property is used in diverse engineering designs including mechanical, civil, materials, electronics and chemical engineering applications. In spite of the advancements made in the past 40 years, the evaluation of this remains challenging for extremely heterogeneous materials such as composite concretes. By taking advantage of the optical properties of a thin birefringent coating on the surface of opaque, notched composite concrete beams, here we sense the evolution of the maximum shear stress distribution on the beams under loading. The location of the maximum deviator stress is tracked ahead of the crack tip on the experimental concrete samples under the ultimate load, and hence the effective crack leng

SUBMITTER: Antony SJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5495800 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature