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Influence of Grain Size and Saturation on the Fracture Toughness of Granitic Rocks

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Highlights

  • Cyclic loading-unloading three-point bending tests are conducted on granitic rocks

  • Fracture toughness decreases by about 10% after saturation

  • Fracture toughness increases with the decrease of mineral grain size

  • Acoustic emissions reveal the progressive damage characteristics of granitic rocks

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Acknowledgements

Thanks are due to Dr. Jian Liu for assistance with the experiments and to Dr. Chunping Wang for valuable discussion. This work was supported by the National Natural Foundation of China under Grant [number 41702344] and Scientific Research Project for Young Talents of China National Nuclear Corporation “Study on prediction technology of host rock crack propagation in a multi-field coupled environment of high-level radioactive waste repository”.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Beijing Research Institute of Uranium Geology, Beijing, 100029, China

    Haiyang Zhang, Liang Chen, Ying Li & Ju Wang

  2. State Key Laboratory of Hydraulics and Mountain River Engineering, Sichuan University, Chengdu, 610065, China

    Jianfeng Liu

Authors
  1. Haiyang Zhang
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  2. Liang Chen
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  3. Jianfeng Liu
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  4. Ying Li
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  5. Ju Wang
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Correspondence to Liang Chen.

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Zhang, H., Chen, L., Liu, J. et al. Influence of Grain Size and Saturation on the Fracture Toughness of Granitic Rocks. Rock Mech Rock Eng 55, 7881–7886 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00603-022-03006-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00603-022-03006-3

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