Micromechanical methods to predict the fracture behavior and estimate the fracture toughness of cellular solids and foams are presented in this paper. The microstructure of the foam is modeled using finite elements. The struts of foam are modeled using either structural elements such as beams or three-dimensional solid elements. A portion of the foam containing an edge crack is modeled. Displac...

An improvement of a new technique for modelling cracks in the nite element framework is presented. A standard displacement-based approximation is enriched near a crack by incorporating both discontinuous elds and the near tip asymptotic elds through a partition of unity method. A methodology that constructs the enriched approximation from the interaction of the crack geometry with the mesh is d...

A novel method for preparing and testing bending specimens in-situ the TEM has been developed. This method provides high visibility of the crack front and its associated plastic zone. This is significant because energy release rates can now be calculated at many points throughout the test based on crack tip opening displacement (CTOD), crack opening angle (COA), and crack advance. Further refin...

To better understand the ductile versus brittle fracture behavior of crystalline materials, attention should be directed towards physically realistic crack geometries. Currently, continuum models of ductile versus brittle behavior are typically based on the analysis of a pre-existing sharp crack in order to use analytical solutions for the stress 8elds around the crack tip. This paper examines ...

We compare experimental observations of a slow interfacial crack propagation along an heterogeneous interface to numerical simulations using a soft-clamped fiber bundle model. The model consists of a planar set of brittle fibers between a deformable elastic half-space and a rigid plate with a square root shape that imposes a non-linear displacement around the process zone. The non-linear square...

This paper is devoted to the characterization of the energy release rate of a crack which is merely closed, connected, and with density 1/2 at the tip. First, the blow-up limit of the displacement is analyzed, and the convergence to the corresponding positively 1/2-homogenous function in the cracked plane is established. Then, the energy release rate is obtained as the derivative of the elastic...

This paper investigates the phenomenon of slant fracture observed in stable tearing tests of many ductile materials, where an initially flat crack, loaded under remote Mode I conditions, tends to grow into a slant crack and stay in the slant configuration until final fracture. In an effort to identify potential reasons why cracks prefer to grow in a slant manner, three-dimensional finite elemen...

Dynamic crack propagation in a unidirectional carbon/epoxy composite is studied through finite element analyses of asymmetric impact (shear loading) of a rod against a rectangular plate. A finite deformation anisotropic visco-plastic model is used to describe the constitutive response of the composite. Crack propagation is simulated by embedding zero thickness interface element along the crack ...