New developments and applications of lumped damage mechanics

Abstract

Despite the great impact that continuum damage mechanics has had on research in structural engineering, its number of applications in the engineering practice is still very small for several reasons. Lumped damage mechanics is a simplified version of continuum damage mechanics that suppresses many of those drawbacks, but it presents a range of applications very restricted. Originally, lumped damage mechanics was obtained by combining the methods of fracture and damage mechanics with the concept of plastic hinge. The result is a very effective approach for the analysis of the frames of buildings or other similar structures subjected to large overloads. This project proposes the development of new extensions of lumped damage mechanics to completely different structures and loadings. These applications are: a) The analysis of cracking in concrete tunnel linings; b) The global analysis of fatigue in bridges and offshore platforms; c) The analysis of cracking in masonry walls of infilled frames. The goal is that these simplified models could replace, or at least complement, the complex finite element analyses that are currently the standard approach to solving these problems. Besides those theoretical studies, it is also proposed the development of the corresponding computational tools that could be implemented in commercial or research programs of nonlinear structural analysis. Finally, it is expected that during the course of the project, strong ties between the two research centers in Brazil and Venezuela could be created for future projects in the longer term. (AU)