12 Dic Doctoral thesis on the characterisation of mode I delamination under different loading rates
Sergio Medina defended his PhD thesis entitled “Methodology for the experimental characterisation of mode I delamination under different loading rates” on November 25, 2022, at the Polytechnic School of the University of Girona. The PhD thesis has been supervised by Dr. Norbert Blanco and Dr. Emili González (AMADE – UdG).
The thesis aimed to define a methodology to characterise the loading rate dependency of the mode I fracture toughness of laminate composites and adhesively bonded joints, for which there is a lack of comprehensive characterisation methods and standards. The objectives of the thesis were to define a threshold for dynamic analysis where inertia effects can be neglected, to develop a test set-up that mitigates the limitations detected in the literature, and to define suitable data reduction methods to determine mode I fracture toughness at intermediate/high loading rates.
The thesis has been funded by the predoctoral grant IFUdG2017/43 of the University of Girona. This doctoral research has been developed within the projects RTI2018-099373-B-I00, RTI2018-097880-B-I00 and RTI2018-094435-B-C32 of the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades and within the BEDYN project funded by the Clean Sky 2 Joint Undertaking (JU) under grant agreement No. 886519. The JU receives support from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme and the Clean Sky 2 JU members other than the Union.
