We study the approach to global breakdown in disordered media driven by increasing external forces. We first analyze the problem by mean-field theory, showing that the failure process can be described as a first-order phase transition, similarly to the case of thermally activated fracture in homogeneous media. Then we quantitatively confirm the predictions of the mean-field theory using numerical simulations of discrete models. Widely distributed avalanches and the corresponding mean-field scaling are explained by the long-range nature of elastic interactions. We discuss the analogy of our results to driven disordered first-order transitions and spinodal nucleation in magnetic systems.
First-Order Transition in the Breakdown of Disordered Media / S. Zapperi, P. Ray, H. Eugene Stanley, A. Vespignani. - In: PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS. - ISSN 0031-9007. - 78:8(1997 Feb 24), pp. 1408-1411.
First-Order Transition in the Breakdown of Disordered Media
S. Zapperi;
1997
Abstract
We study the approach to global breakdown in disordered media driven by increasing external forces. We first analyze the problem by mean-field theory, showing that the failure process can be described as a first-order phase transition, similarly to the case of thermally activated fracture in homogeneous media. Then we quantitatively confirm the predictions of the mean-field theory using numerical simulations of discrete models. Widely distributed avalanches and the corresponding mean-field scaling are explained by the long-range nature of elastic interactions. We discuss the analogy of our results to driven disordered first-order transitions and spinodal nucleation in magnetic systems.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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