Mechanics of damage, healing, damageability, and integrity of materials: A conceptual framework

In this work several new and fundamental concepts are proposed within the framework of continuum damage mechanics. These concepts deal primarily with the nature of the two processes of damage and healing along with introducing a consistent and systematic definition for the concepts of damageability and integrity of materials. Toward this end, seven sections are presented as follows: “The logarithmic damage variable” section introduces the logarithmic and exponential damage variables and makes comparisons with the classical damage variable. In “Integrity and damageability of materials” section a new formulation for damage mechanics is presented in which the two angles of damage–integrity and healing–damageability are introduced. It is shown that both the damage variable and the integrity variable can be derived from the damage–integrity angle while the healing variable and damageability variable are derived from the healing–damageability angle. “The integrity field” section introduces the new concept of the integrity field while “The healing field” section introduces the new concept of the healing field. These two fields are introduced as a generalization of the classical concepts of damage and integrity. “Unhealable damage and nondamageable integrity” section introduces the new and necessary concept of unrecoverable damage or unhealable damage. In this section the concept of permanent integrity or nondamageable integrity is also presented. In “Generalized nonlinear healing” section generalized healing is presented where a distinction is clearly made between linear healing and nonlinear healing. As an example of nonlinear healing the equations of quadratic healing are derived. Finally in “Dissection of the healing process” section a complete and logical/mathematical dissection is made of the healing process. It is hoped that these new and fundamental concepts will pave the way for new, consistent, and holistic avenues in research in damage mechanics and characterization of materials.