2015/06/02 by J. Gianfelice de Castro, de Castro, Janaina G., Rojman Zargar +13
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #Force Microscopy Techniques and Applications #Polymer Nanocomposites and Properties #Polymer crystallization and properties #Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft)
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1506.00832
openalex publication_date 2015/06/02 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Polymer composite materials are widely used for their exceptional mechanical properties, notably their ability to resist large deformations. Here we examine the failure stress and strain of rubbers reinforced by varying amounts of nano-sized silica particles. We find that small amounts of silica increase the fracture stress and strain, but too much filler makes the material become brittle and consequently fracture happens at small deformations. We thus find that as a function of the amount of filler there is an optimum in the breaking resistance at intermediate filler concentrations. We use a modified Griffith theory to establish a direct relation between the material properties and the fracture behavior that agrees with the experiment.