IUTAM symposium on mesoscopic dynamics of fracture process and materials strength. Proceedings of the IUTAM symposium held in Osaka, Japan, July 6--11, 2003. Volume in celebration of Professor Kitagawa's retirement. (Q705826)

This volume presents Proceedings of the IUTAM Symposium, 2003 and concentrates on current understanding of fracture processes and inhomogeneous deformation, governing the materials strength with emphasis on the mesoscopic dynamics associated with evolutional mechanical behavior under micro/macro mutual interaction. New theoretical and computational techniques, various novel challenges to investigate the mesoscopic dynamics are discussed, including large-scaled 3D atomistic simulations, discrete dislocation dynamics and other micro/mesoscopic computational considerations. The Proceedings comprise a wide variety of fundamental subjects of physics, mechanical models, computational strategies as well as engineering applications. The main computational approaches are connected with use of the molecular dynamics methods. Moreover, the finite element method, Monte Carlo simulations, Voronoi construction, etc. are presented, too. As a rule, the numerical results are accompanied by experimental/theoretical studies. As the main subjects, it should be noted the next: (i) dislocation patterning, (ii) crystal plasticity, (iii) characteristic fracture of amorphouses/nanocrystals, (iv) nanoindentation, (v) ductile-brittle transition, (vi) ideal strength, (vii) ab-initio calculation, (viii) computational methodology for multi-scale analysis, etc. The broad set of materials and compositions is considered, including bcc and fcc structures, superalloys, amorphous systems, semiconductors, ceramics, polycrystalline aggregates, composites and nanostructures. A great place is devoted to fatigue loading and different influences on the fracture resistance and crack amplification. Especial attention is directed to physical basis of the material strength and fracture toughness, to structure defect nucleation and growth, to statement of the corresponding criteria and threshold values. The Proceedings present novel physical conceptions and approaches to solution of dynamical damage and fracture problems for heterogeneous materials on the base of atomistic considerations, homogenization methods, field theory, irreversible thermodynamics, quantum mechanics, etc.