The fracture of highly deformable soft materials: A tale of two length scales
arXiv:2004.03159 · doi:10.1146/annurev-conmatphys-042020-023937
Abstract
The fracture of highly deformable soft materials is of great practical importance in a wide range of technological applications, emerging in fields such as soft robotics, stretchable electronics and tissue engineering. From a basic physics perspective, the failure of these materials poses fundamental challenges due to the strongly nonlinear and dissipative deformation involved. In this review, we discuss the physics of cracks in soft materials and highlight two length scales that characterize the strongly nonlinear elastic and dissipation zones near crack tips in such materials. We discuss physical processes, theoretical concepts and mathematical results that elucidate the nature of the two length scales, and show that the two length scales can classify a wide range of materials. The emerging multi-scale physical picture outlines the theoretical ingredients required for the development of predictive theories of the fracture soft materials. We conclude by listing open challenges and future investigation directions.
arXiv commentAn invited review article, 36 pages, 7 figures
References in corpus (15)
- Solvent control of crack dynamics in a reversible hydrogel
- Adhesion between a viscoelastic material and a solid surface
- Fracture of a biopolymer gel as a viscoplastic disentanglement process
- The Dynamics of Rapid Fracture: Instabilities, Nonlinearities and Length Scales
- The Breakdown of Linear Elastic Fracture Mechanics near the Tip of a Rapid Crack
- Instability in dynamic fracture and the failure of the classical theory of cracks
- Oscillations in Rapid Fracture
- Weakly Nonlinear Theory of Dynamic Fracture
- Dynamics of Simple Cracks
- The 1/r singularity in weakly nonlinear fracture mechanics
- Mode I fracture of a biopolymer gel: rate-dependent dissipation and large deformations disentangled
- How super-tough gels break
- Dynamic Crack Tip Equation of Motion: High-speed Oscillatory Instability
- An intrinsic nonlinear scale governs oscillations in rapid fracture
- Universality and stability phase-diagram of two-dimensional brittle fracture
Cited by in corpus (16)
- Polyply: a python suite for facilitating simulations of (bio-)macromolecules and nanomaterials
- Tri-branched gels: Rubbery materials with the lowest branching factor approach the ideal elastic limit
- A statistical mechanics framework for polymer chain scission, based on the concepts of distorted bond potential and asymptotic matching
- Force-dependent bond dissociation explains the rate-dependent fracture of vitrimers
- The role of crosslinking density in surface stress and surface energy of soft solids
- Crack tip kinematics reveal the cohesive zone structure in brittle hydrogel fracture
- How hidden 3D structure within crack fronts reveals energy balance
- Oscillatory and tip-splitting instabilities in 2D dynamic fracture: The roles of intrinsic material length and time scales
- On modeling fracture of soft polymers
- Size selection of crack front defects: Multiple fracture-plane interactions and intrinsic lengthscales
- Phantom Chain Simulations for Fracture of End-linking Networks
- Theory of unconventional singularities of frictional shear cracks
- Correlating thermodynamics, morphology, mechanics and thermal transport in PMMA-PLA blends
- Analytical Expression for Fracture Profile in Viscoelastic Crack Propagation
- Modeling crack propagation in heterogeneous materials: Griffith's law, intrinsic crack resistance and avalanches
- Non-equilibrium pathways between cluster morphologies in active phase separation: necking, rupture and cavitation