fracture mechanics

Dear all,



Just in case it is of interest to some of you, we provide links to three postprints related to our Abaqus implementation of the X-FEM. The latest is an "article in press" in Eng Frac Mech where we explain the essentials of the implementation and provide a link to the source code for the Abaqus computation. Note that the implementation is limited to 2D and the pre-processing code needed for element subdivision is not provided.

Composite Vehicle Research Center (CVRC) at MSU has an immediate opening for a postdoctoral research associate to conduct research in non-destructive evaluation (NDE) and structural health monitoring (SHM) of composite materials in an effort to develop self-diagnostic composite structures for air and ground vehicles. 

http://www.egr.msu.edu/~shong/Postdoc.html

I would like to invite everyone attending the 2008 ASME IMECE next week in Boston to attend a keynote lecture given by Prof. Ted Belytschko of Northwestern University.  The lecture will occur at 1:45 PM on Tuesday, November 4, and will be entitled "Multiscale Computations of Fracture - When Does Flaw Tolerance Occur?" 

Further information on Prof. Belytschko's talk can be found here: 

http://www.asmeconferences.org/Congress08/PlenarySessions.cfm

 It is a common technique in modelling cracked bodies with finite element method, to refine the mesh near the crack tip. It is mentioned in text books, mesh refinement is nessecary to increase the acuuracy of the computed stress intensity factor for the crack tip. Is meshrefinement nessecary for computing eigen-properties ( natural frequencies and natural modes ) as well as SIF? or eigen properties are not affected much by the near crack tip field?

CSIRO Petroleum in Melbourne, Australia, welcomes applications to a Postdoctoral Fellowship
in hydraulic fracture stimulation mechanics. The successful candidate
will have a background in applied mechanics and numerical methods with
an interest in verifying numerical calculations by experiment.  The
research results will be applied to stimulation of hot fractured rock
geothermal reservoirs.

The Adhesion Society will hold its 32nd Annual Meeting in Savannah, GA February 15-18, 2009; uniting chemists, physicists, mechanists, engineers, and biologists concerned with the design and characterization of materials interfaces and their associated property of adhesion.  Adhesion and interfacial constrol are key to the development of nano- and bio- based technologies as well structural and cosmetic applications that influence society in everyday life. 

As a follow up to my first blog , I would like to know if the experimental data of applied loads and crack sizes or lengths, are sufficient to model the R-curve behaviour via the Fracture Mechanics approach.