Probabilistic modeling of quasibrittle fracture and size effect

• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: extreme value statistics; Weibull theory; fracture mechanics; quasibrittle materi- als; Sea ice
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.571.5509; http://www.civil.northwestern.edu/people/bazant/PDFs/Papers/S44.pdf

size effect, scaling, nonlocal damage,material length, stochastic finite element method, fractal cracks, reliability ABSTRACT: Progress in structural design requires probabilistic modeling of quasibrittle fracture, which is typical of concrete, fiber composites, rocks, toughened ceramics, sea ice and many ‘high tech ’ materials. The most important consequence of quasibrittle behavior is a deterministic (energetic) size effect, the theory of which evolved near the end of last century. After a review of the background, the present plenary lecture describes the recent efforts to combine the classical Weibull theory of statistical size effect due to local strength randomness with the recently developed energetic theory, and also surveys various related problems, such as the probability tail structure of the stochastic finite element methods, the random scatter in fracture testing, the role of fractal nature of cracks, the reliability provisions of design codes, and the lessons from past structural catastrophes. 1