Critical Scaling of Solid Fragmentation at Quasistatic and Finite Strain Rates

Joel T. Clemmer and Mark O. Robbins

Phys. Rev. Lett. 129, 078002 – Published 11 August 2022

Abstract

Using two-dimensional simulations of sheared, brittle solids, we characterize the resulting fragmentation and explore its underlying critical nature. Under quasistatic loading, a power-law distribution of fragment masses emerges after fracture which grows with increasing strain. With increasing strain rate, the maximum size of a grain decreases and a shallower distribution is produced. We propose a scaling theory for distributions based on a fractal scaling of the largest mass with system size in the quasistatic limit or with a correlation length that diverges as a power of rate in the finite-rate limit. Critical exponents are measured using finite-size scaling techniques.

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Received 5 October 2021
Revised 29 May 2022
Accepted 21 July 2022

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.129.078002

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Fracture Self-organized criticality Shear deformation

Polymers & Soft Matter

Authors & Affiliations

Joel T. Clemmer ¹ and Mark O. Robbins²

¹Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87185, USA
²Department of Physics and Astronomy, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21218, USA