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Study on the Mechanism of Rock Damage Under Microwave and Laser Irradiation Through Multiscale and Multiphysics Numerical Modelling

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Abstract

High-energy microwaves and lasers are applied to assist mechanical rock breaking due to their advantages in rapid thermal damage to hard rocks. However, the quantitative evaluation of rock damage under microwave and laser irradiation has always been a difficult problem. In this study, a multiscale and multiphysics numerical modelling approach is developed to quantitatively describe rock thermal damage under microwave and laser irradiation. By coupling the concept of the grain-based model (GBM), electromagnetic-thermal solution of COMSOL, and thermo-mechanical fracture simulation of the four-dimensional lattice spring model (4D-LSM), a fine-grained multiphysics numerical model is developed to quantitatively investigate rock damage during muffle furnace heating and microwave heating. Through a full comparison between the fine-grained numerical simulations and experimental results, we concluded that the rock thermal damage functions of these two heating methods are dominantly influenced by the meso-structure and mineral composition of the rock rather than the temperature gradient. Moreover, the limitation of temperature measurement is the most likely reason for the experimentally observed difference in rock thermal damage between muffle furnace heating and microwave heating. For a coarse-grained multiphysics numerical model for larger scale analysis, the influences of meso-structure and mineral composition on the rock thermal damage can be considered by introducing thermal damage functions. Our numerical study indicates that rock thermal damage functions obtained by using experimental data from muffle furnace heating can be used for microwave or laser irradiation, and a calibration method using a weight function with a single correction coefficient is developed to further address the difference in experimental conditions, the change in simulated scale, and the discreteness of used experimental data. Our coarse-grained multiphysics numerical model with thermal damage functions calibrated by data from a single experiment is verified to be able to quantitatively predict the experimentally observed microwave-induced and laser-induced rock damage. This study provides the possibility and methodology to reuse experimental data for rock thermal damage by muffle furnace heating in the analysis of rock damage under microwave and laser irradiation.

Highlights

  • Rock thermal damage during muffle furnace heating and microwave heating is quantitatively investigated by using a fine-grained multiphysics numerical model.

  • The limitation of temperature measurement is the most likely reason for the experimentally observed difference in rock thermal damage between muffle furnace heating and microwave heating.

  • A calibration method using a weight function with a single correction coefficient is developed to obtain thermal damage functions for microwave or laser irradiation from thermal damage functions for muffle furnace heating.

  • A coarse-grained multiphysics numerical model with thermal damage functions calibrated by data from a single experiment is verified to be able to quantitatively predict experimentally observed rock thermal damage under microwave and laser irradiation.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author.

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Acknowledgements

This research is funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 51979187).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Hydraulic Engineering Intelligent Construction and Operation, School of Civil Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, 300072, China

    Fuxin Rui & Gao-Feng Zhao

  2. School of Civil and Transportation Engineering, Hebei University of Technology, Tianjin, 300401, China

    Yuliang Zhang

  3. College of Architecture and Civil Engineering, Beijing University of Technology, Beijing, 100124, China

    Lifeng Fan

  4. School of Earth Sciences and Engineering, Nanjing University, Nanjing, 210093, China

    Xiaobao Zhao

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  1. Fuxin Rui
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  2. Gao-Feng Zhao
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Contributions

Fuxin Rui: methodology, numerical modelling, validation, formal analysis, data processing, visualization, writing-original draft, writing-review and editing. Gao-Feng Zhao: supervision, project administration, funding acquisition, software, methodology, writing-review and editing. Yuliang Zhang: numerical modelling, code, writing-review and editing. Lifeng Fan: experimental data, supervision, writing-review and editing. Xiaobao Zhao: experimental data, supervision, writing-review and editing.

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Correspondence to Gao-Feng Zhao.

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Rui, F., Zhao, GF., Zhang, Y. et al. Study on the Mechanism of Rock Damage Under Microwave and Laser Irradiation Through Multiscale and Multiphysics Numerical Modelling. Rock Mech Rock Eng 57, 1079–1102 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00603-023-03608-5

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