What is it about?
Fracture mechanics is the scientific branch in Materials Science which dedicates to study and quantification of the stresses which can be supported by a material when it contains a crack inside of it. Brittle materials supposedly, always have a crack inside it.
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Why is it important?
Strength of structures is not only defined by the yield strength or the ultimate tensile strength, materials in a structure may contain defects which impair their strength. Brittle materials in particular have the particularity of being particularly susceptible to this since they can be assumed to always posses crack -like defects in their interiors. Brittle polymers are also affected by this, but the methods of measuring the fracture toughness (the material property which quantifies the strength of a structure containing a crack) are less established. This work investigates the fracture toughness test applied to polymethyl metacrylate (PMMA), as a prototype for brittle polymers.
Perspectives
It is alway a pleasure to see a student developing, and this was the case, Dr. Souza started working with me in his master in engineering and finished his PhD with this thesis, and he learned a lot in the process. This was also a pleasure because of the collaborations. Dr. Souza interacted heavily with Dr Peres, and we all profited from the experience of Prof. Yoshimura.
Professor Claudio Geraldo Schön
Universidade de Sao Paulo Campus da Capital
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Effect of sample pre-cracking method and notch geometry in plane strain fracture toughness tests as applied to a PMMA resin, Polymer Testing, September 2012, Elsevier,
DOI: 10.1016/j.polymertesting.2012.06.003.
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