Scaling of surface roughness in perfectly plastic disordered media

Morphological study of elastic-plastic-brittle transitions in disordered media

We use a spring lattice model with springs following a bilinear elastoplastic-brittle constitutive behavior with spatial disorder in the yield and failure thresholds to study patterns of plasticity and damage evolution. The elastic-perfectly plastic transition is observed to follow percolation scaling with the correlation length critical exponent ν≈1.59, implying the universality class corresponding to the long-range correlated percolation. A quantitative analysis of the plastic strain accumulation reveals a dipolar anisotropy (for antiplane loading) which vanishes with increasing hardening modulus. A parametric study with hardening modulus and ductility controlled through the spring level constitutive response demonstrates a wide spectrum of behaviors with varying degree of coupling between plasticity and damage evolution.

Elastic-plastic-brittle transitions and avalanches in disordered media

A spring lattice model with the ability to simulate elastic-plastic-brittle transitions in a disordered medium is presented. The model is based on bilinear constitutive law defined at the spring level and power-law-type disorder introduced in the yield and failure limits of the springs. The key parameters of the proposed model effectively control the disorder distribution, significantly affecting the stress-strain response, the damage accumulation process, and the fracture surfaces. The model demonstrates a plastic strain avalanche behavior for perfectly plastic as well as hardening materials with a power-law distribution, in agreement with the experiments and related models. The strength of the model is in its generality and ability to interpolate between elastic-plastic hardening and elastic-brittle transitions.