Damage in composites: From physical mechanisms to modelling

The most critical types of damage in composite materials are transverse cracking, delamination and fiber breaking. The simulation of the behaviour and the rupture of these materials shows that it is important to consider failure mechanism in the design of structures. Each mechanism induces local deteriorations which can be accelerated when they are coupled with other mechanisms. Global criteria are unable to predict neither these processes nor their interactions. This paper is an attempt to propose realistic criteria which are the witness of local degradations and can be used for the design of composite structures.