How Supertough Gels Break
Abstract
Fracture of highly stretched materials challenges our view of how things break. We directly visualize rupture of tough double-network gels at >50% strain. During fracture, crack tip shapes obey a x ∼y1.6 power law, in contrast to the parabolic profile observed in low-strain cracks. A new length scale ℓ emerges from the power law; we show that ℓ scales directly with the stored elastic energy and diverges when the crack velocity approaches the shear wave speed. Our results show that double-network gels undergo brittle fracture and provide a testing ground for large-strain fracture mechanics.
- Publication:
-
Physical Review Letters
- Pub Date:
- September 2018
- DOI:
- 10.1103/PhysRevLett.121.135501
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1808.07902
- Bibcode:
- 2018PhRvL.121m5501K
- Keywords:
-
- Condensed Matter - Soft Condensed Matter;
- Condensed Matter - Materials Science
- E-Print:
- Phys. Rev. Lett. 121, 135501 (2018)