Dynamic fracture mechanisms in nanostructured and amorphous silica glasses million-atom molecular dynamics simulations

Parallel molecular dynamics simulations are performed to investigate dynamic fracture in bulk and nanostructured silica glasses at room temperature and 1000 K. In bulk silica the crack front develops multiple branches and nanoscale pores open up ahead of the crack tip. Pores coalesce and then they merge with the advancing crack-front to cause cleavage fracture. The calculated fracture toughness is in good agreement with experiments. In nanostructured silica the crack-front meanders along intercluster boundaries, merging with nanoscale pores in these regions to cause intergranular fracture. The failure strain in nanostructured silica is significantly larger than in the bulk systems.