Abstract:

Variational phase-field models of brittle fracture have proven highly successful for studying Griffith-type crack propagation in complex settings. However, since Griffith’s theory does not incorporate a material strength criterion, these models have limited flexibility in accurately predicting crack nucleation under multiaxial stress conditions.

This talk presents a recently developed variational phase-field model for cohesive fracture that accommodates arbitrary convex strength surfaces independently of the regularization length scale. The formulation generates sharp cohesive cracks, naturally enforces a non-interpenetration condition, and consistently reproduces both hardening and softening behavior.

The seminar will also cover recent advances on the comparison of different strength criteria, improved finite element implementation through local eigenstrain solutions, and the extension of the model to dynamic fracture, including applications to elastic wave interaction with pre-existing cracks and crack propagation.

Biography:

Laura De Lorenzis is Professor of Computational Mechanics at ETH Zürich since 2020, following faculty appointments in Germany and Italy. She is a Fellow of EUROMECH and IACM, recipient of several international awards, and author or co-author of more than 160 journal publications. She has delivered over 30 plenary lectures at international conferences and, since 2023, serves as Editor-in-Chief of Computer Methods in Applied Mechanics and Engineering.