Graphene reinforced polymer composites: 3D micromechanical modelling, damage and fracture

3D computational model of graphene reinforced polymer composites is developed and applied to the analysis of damage and fracture mechanisms in the composites. The graphene/polymer interface properties are determined using the inverse modeling approach. The effect of composite structure, in particular, of the aspect ratio, shape, clustering, orientation and volume fraction of graphene platelets on the
mechanical behavior and damage mechanisms of nanocomposites are studied in computational experiments.
It was shown that the structural imperfections of graphene reinforcement (like crumpling shape or random misalignment) have considerable effect on the composite performances.