Soft polymeric materials such as elastomers and hydrogels have played a significant role in
recent interdisciplinary research. They are subjected to large stretch and high cyclic loading …

Silicone elastomers are extremely attractive materials due to their wide range of possible
applications, from biomedical engineering to soft robotics. In this work, an extensive thermo …

We have discovered a peculiar form of fracture that occurs in a highly stretchable silicone
elastomer (Smooth-On Ecoflex 00–30). Under certain conditions, cracks propagate in a …

With the emergence of different dielectric elastomer transducers, the characterizations of
dielectric elastomers are essential aspects for the design purpose. In this work, two potential …

In this paper, some aspects of the physical mechanisms involved in strain-induced
crystallization (SIC) in cross-linked natural rubber networks are discussed. The theory of SIC …

In this work, the phase field method (PFM) is applied for modeling fracture in the polymeric
type of materials. Considering the large extensibility of polymer chains before fracture, a …

This work provides a direct comparison of several experimental approaches used in the
literature to measure fracture toughness of rubber of rubber using single edge notched in …

Natural rubber (NR) exhibits strain-induced crystallization (SIC), enhancing tearing strength
and crack resistance. However, the reinforcement mechanism along with nonuniform strain …

We characterized the strain energy release rate and local crack-tip strain field for elastic
hydrogels under several types of biaxial loading: planar, unequal biaxial, and equibiaxial …

Abstract The “local” and “global” complex-variable finite element methods were extended for
computing the energy release rate (ERR) of materials undergoing nonlinear elastic …