Materials and Design 31 (2010) 19451952

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Materials and Design

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/matdes

On the comparison of the ballistic performance of 10% zirconia toughened

alumina and 95% alumina ceramic target
X.F. Zhang a,*, Y.C. Li b
a
b

School of Mechanical Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing 210094, Jiangsu, China
Department of Mechanics and Mechanical Eng., University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027, Anhui, China

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 15 August 2009
Accepted 22 October 2009
Available online 25 October 2009
Keywords:
A. Engineering ceramics
E. Impact and ballistic
I. Brittle fracture

a b s t r a c t
Ballistic performance of different type of ceramic materials subjected to high velocity impact was investigated in many theoretical, experimental and numerical studies. In this study, a comparison of ballistic
performance of 95% alumina ceramic and 10% zirconia toughened alumina (ZTA) ceramic tiles was analyzed theoretically and experimentally. Spherical cavity model based on the concepts of mechanics of
compressible porous media of Galanov was used to analyze the relation of target resistance and static
mechanical properties. Experimental studies were carried out on the ballistic performance of above
two types of ceramic tiles based on the depth of penetration (DOP) method, when subjected to normal
impact of tungsten long rod projectiles. Typical damaged targets were presented. The residual depth of
penetration on after-effect target was measured in all experiments, and the ballistic efciency factor of
above two types ceramic plates were determined. Both theoretical and experimental results show that
the improvement on ballistic resistance was clearly observed by increasing fracture toughness in ZTA
ceramics.
2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Ceramic materials are widely used in armor systems as well as
aircraft structures, ghting vehicles and tanks for the advantages of
low density, high compressive strength and hardness [1]. Response
of ceramics to projectile impact and other types of high-speed
loading conditions are thus a relevant issue for these applications.
Ballistic performance of many types of ceramics was investigated
in many experimental, theoretical and numerical studies. A brief
review of the progress penetration/perforation of ceramic targets
can be found in [2]. A great amount of these studies regarding ceramic targets subjected to high velocity impact investigate the
behavior of materials under impact load. All the results show that
ceramic materials have better ballistic performance than ordinary
armor materials such as rolled homogeneous armor (RHA).
In spite of the excellent physical and mechanical properties of
ceramics, the main drawbacks are their brittleness, large scatter
of strength and easy crack growth. The inherent brittleness of
ceramics makes special considerations necessary in designing with
these materials as armor systems. In ductile metals, localized stresses that exceed the yield point are usually relieved by local plastic
deformation that redistributes the stress into a wider area, preventing fracture. Ceramics, however, have no such yield point; they
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 2584317853; fax: +86 2584315454.
E-mail address: lynx@mail.njust.edu.cn (X.F. Zhang).
0261-3069/$ - see front matter 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.matdes.2009.10.046

fail when localized stresses exceed material strength. Typically,

elastic behavior is linear right up to the fracture point. Moreover,
they usually have high modulus of elasticity, which results in fracture at relatively small strains. Considerable effort has been expended aimed at increasing the ductility, or toughness, of
ceramic materials. The directions that appear most promising involve transformation toughening and reinforcing the matrix with
a dispersed phase such as bers or whiskers, for example, phase
transformation of ZrO2 from tetragonal to monoclinic is one efcient way to improve the toughness of ceramic material, especially
in alumina. Examples of such applications include cutting tools,
drill bits, wear parts, structural and electronic components, electrodes, biomechanical devices, lightweight armor, and gasturbine
components [3]. Researchers all over the world investigated the
mechanical properties of toughened ceramic materials, recently research results can be found in [46]. These studies have described
various aspects of toughening mechanisms in increasing the ductility of ceramic materials, and mechanical properties improvement
were highlighted both in compression and tension. For the ballistic
performance of toughened ceramic material, ballistic evaluation
was carried based on several toughened alumina targets by Hagg
[7], and the result shows that toughened ceramic material exhibit
an improvement of ballistic performance in some test. At end of
their report, they suggest that more experiments should be conducted to determine the reason why some specimen performed
so outstandingly.

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X.F. Zhang, Y.C. Li / Materials and Design 31 (2010) 19451952

Zirconia toughened alumina (ZTA) ceramic is the most important, widely used and cost effective oxide ceramic material based
on phase transformation toughening method. It has wear and corrosion resistance along with high strength and toughness and typical zirconia content in ZTA is between 10% and 20%. The
mechanical properties of ZTA have been investigated by researchers all over the world. Recent research progress related to ZTA
mechanical properties can be found in [812], all the research results show ZTA ceramics predominate mechanism for improvement of mechanical properties. Contrast with the widely
researches on mechanical properties for ZTA, little effort has been
expended aimed at the ballistic performance assessments. Some
ballistic test results were provided by Sun [13] and Zhang [14,15]
which give a limited evidence of improved ballistic performance
by increasing fracture toughness of ZTA ceramics.
This paper presents a comparison of ballistic performance of
10% ZTA and 95% alumina ceramic tiles. Spherical cavity model
based on mechanics of compressible porous media of Galanov
was used to analyze the relation of target resistance and static
mechanical properties. Ballistic tests were performed on the ballistic efciency of 10% ZTA and 95% alumina ceramic tiles, backed by
metal plates, against the impact of tungsten long rod projectiles
(LRP). The impact velocity of LRP was varied from 1100 to
1500 ms1 and inuences on the ballistic efciency were studied.
Experimental results show that the penetration resistance of alumina ceramics can be improved signicantly by phase transformation toughness method of ZrO2.

2. ZTA ceramic materials and mechanical characteristics

With the development of materials science, researchers all over
the world found various toughness methods with which to improve the fracture characteristics of ceramic materials. The fracture
toughness and the strength of ceramic material can be signicantly
improved by the mechanism of transformation toughening, intergranular dispersion strengthening, or intragranular dispersion
strengthening. In transformation toughening, the secondary phase
particles, while constrained by the ceramic matrix, expand during
phase transformation, resulting in residual stresses around each
secondary phase particle, which have to be nullied for the crack
to propagate through the transformed zone, i.e., increased fracture
toughness. An example of transformation toughening is alumina
toughened by tetragonal or monoclinic zirconia particles [16].
The toughening mechanisms of ZTA ceramics are as follows [17]:
Pure zirconia is monoclinic (m) at room temperature and pressure. With increasing temperature the material transforms to
tetragonal (t), at approximately 1170 C and then to a cubic (c)
uorite structure starting about 2370 C with melting at 2716 C
[18,19]. Phase changing which causes volume expansion on cooling, c?t by approximately 2.31%; t?m by approximately 4.5%, will
induce micro-cracks in ceramic materials. This small size of microcracks will scatter and absorb the energy of the opening of the
main crack tip when there is an impact loading on ceramic material, and this will improve the fracture toughness of ceramic
material.
In the present paper the 95% alumina ceramic and 10% ZTA
ceramic are produced by Shandong institute for the production of
industrial ceramics design of China. A high purity alumina powder
was mixed with other oxides powder such as zirconia, magnesia.
The samples were sintered then machined to plates of
U100 mm  10 mm and U100 mm  20 mm. The material components are shown in Table 1. Quasi-static mechanical experiment
has been conducted on above two types of ceramic [18], and the
mechanical properties were listed in Table 2.

Table 1
Material components of 10% ZTA ceramic and 95% alumina ceramic.
Ceramic type

10% ZTA ceramic (%)

95% Alumina ceramic (%)

Al2O3
ZrO2
SiO2
CaO
MgO

85
10
2
2
1

95

2.5
1.5
1

Table 2
Mechanical properties of 10% ZTA ceramic and 95% alumina ceramic.
Parameters
3

Density, q0 (g/m )
Initial porosity, h0
Static yield limit, Y (GPa)
Static Youngs modulus, E0 (GPa)
Dynamic Youngs modulus, E (GPa)
Tensile strength, rf (GPa)
Poissonss ratio, v
Surface wave speed, CR (m/s)

95% Alumina ceramic

10% ZTA

3.5437
0.091
2.20
190
277
0.220
0.23
8900

3.7320
0.088
2.15
190
272
0.667
0.20
8820

Addition of ZrO2 to alumina ceramic, generally increases its

toughness, but always reduces its hardness. Improved toughness
of ceramic material is reported to have both benecial and detrimental effects in improving the dynamic mechanical properties
[19], especially in anti-penetration process. It has a positive contribution of fracture toughness but reduce the penetration resistance
of ceramic target, and the combination performance of toughness
and hardness should be veried in future research. This combination performance is actually the result of two distinct effects: (a)
the dynamic yield stress effects and (b) the toughness effect. Target
resistance is a combination effect of mechanical properties of ceramic material during penetration, and it should be analyzed both
theoretically and experimentally.
3. Target resistance of toughening ceramic material
For high velocity penetration problems, various hydrodynamic
theories have been developed using similar modications of Bernouillis equation. Tate [20] represented the pressure on the axis
at the interface as:

P qt U 2 =2 Rt qp V  U2 Y p

The terms Rt and Yp were identied as the strength terms for the
target and penetrator materials respectively. qt and qp are target
and penetrator densities respectively, U is the penetration velocity,
and V is the free ight projectile velocity. In Eq. (1), qt and qp are
constant and it is assumed that once in motion the penetrator and
target materials behave as frictionless incompressible uids. In order to get a better ballistic performance (smaller penetration depth
at same interface pressure), higher target resistance Rt (strength
term for target) would then be required to get smaller value of
penetration velocity.
Target resistance is Rt a material dependent parameter which
determine by target yield strength, dencity, Possions ratio and
modulus etc. Lots of analytical theories have been developed to
determine the target resistance Rt, and the most important one is
cavity expansion theory. It assume that a pressure needed in expanded a cavity in target material, and cavity expansion theory
provides an good analogy for the target resistance in high velocity
impact if dynamic properties of the target are substituted for quasi-static properties. The theory for spherical cavity expansion in a
ductile target was developed many years ago by Hill [21]. The extended review and detailed analysis of exiting models of cavity

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X.F. Zhang, Y.C. Li / Materials and Design 31 (2010) 19451952

Rt  r

a3hk

4.8
f =0.1GPa
f =0.7GPa

3.6
3.2
2.8
0.5

4.0

ev er 2eu 

r
E

s!
2rf
1  1  v
r

Rt /Y

h 1  1  h0 expev

The terms h* and ev are the total porosity and volumetric strain of
material at boundary between dilatation region and pulverized region respectively. h0 is the initial porosity of material, v and E are
Possions ratio and Youngs modulus, Y and rf are material yield
strength and uniaxial tensile strength respectively.

r
K

2.0
2.5
Y /GPa

3.0

3.5

4.0

4.8
4.4

ev 

1.5

3r 
E

r!
1  v 2rf
1
2
r

Y=1.0GPa
Y=2.0GPa
Y=3.0GPa
Y=4.0GPa

3.6
3.2
2.8
0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

f /GPa

Fig. 3. The solution for the ratio of target resistance to yield strength as function of
tensile strength.

Elastic region
Dilatation and pore
formation region

5.5
Y =1.0GPa
Y =2.0GPa
Y =3.0GPa
Y =4.0GPa

5.0

Pulverized region

4.5

Cavity

b
c

Rt /Y

1.0

Fig. 2. The solution for the ratio of target resistance to yield strength as function of
yield strength.

21  h 3=2
p

Y
3 h

a3

f =1.0GPa

4.0

where r* is the stress depends only on material properties, which

dened as:

r

f =0.4GPa

4.4

Rt /Y

expansion with different rheology can be found in Satapathy

[22,23]. In these models, MohrCoulomb law was used to characterize the pressureshear behavior of a ductile material in comminuted (pulverized) region employing internal friction coefcient,
and cavity expansion pressure essentially depends upon this coefcient. To estimate this coefcient a tting experiment is necessary, which complicates the application of these models. In
present research, a cavity pressure determine method developed
by Galanov [24] based on the concepts of mechanics of compressible porous and power material is used to analyzed the combination performance of toughening and high strength.
Fig. 1 presents a geometrical scheme of spherical cavity expansion which shows three zones with different stressstrain states of
material: (1) the region near the cavity is comminuted (pulverized)
region with a < r < b; (2) next to the comminuted zone is the dilatation and pore formation (radially cracked) region with b < r < c;
(3) and beyond the radially cracked is the elastic region with r > c.
In Galanovs model, the target resistance Rt (pressure in cavity)
is written as:

4.0
3.5
3.0
2.5
2.0
0

10

0 /%
Fig. 1. Model scheme of spherical expansion in spherical coordinates.

Fig. 4. The solution for the ratio of target resistance to yield strength as function of
initial porosity of material.

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X.F. Zhang, Y.C. Li / Materials and Design 31 (2010) 19451952

Table 3
Results of calculations of properties of 10% ZTA ceramic and 95% alumina ceramic.
Ceramic material
*

r /GPa
h*
hj

ej

v*
a/b
Rt/GPa

95% Alumina ceramic

10% ZTA ceramic

3.97
0.0996
0.0910
0.0165
0.0635
0.399
5.10

4.04
0.0937
0.0880
0.0167
0.0573
0.386
5.20

where K is the modulus of uniform compression and dened by:

1
1
3
hk

K K s 1  hk 4 Gs 1  hk 3

Fig. 7. Photographs of original shot of tungsten long rod projectile.

Here Ks and Gs are modules of uniform compression and shearing of

porousless material, respectively.

hk 1 eV h  eV

where hk is the porosity of material in comminuted region.

In order to analyze the inuence static of mechanical properties
to ballistic performance for ceramic materials, we rst compared
target resistance results for yield strength Y, uniaxial tensile
strength rf and initial porosity h, respectively. As shown in Fig. 2,
the inuence of yield strength to target resistance Rt at different level of tensile strength, from which can see the nonlinear relation

COVER PLATE

Table 4
Mechanical properties of projectile and after-effect target.
Material

Density
(g cm3)

Yong
module
(GPa)

Tensile
strength
(MPa)

Yield
strength
(GPa)

Tungsten long rod projectile

Medium steel

17.2
7.85

255
180

160
150

3.060
0.494

CERAMIC TILE

AFTER-EFFECT TARGET

PENETRATOR

P res

Fig. 5. Target conguration in the DOP test.

Time recoder

Gunjet lock

25mm ballistic gun

Ceramic target

Sabot Recycling

Aluminum
foil
Basement

Fig. 6. Experiment layout conguration for ballistic test.

Basement

X.F. Zhang, Y.C. Li / Materials and Design 31 (2010) 19451952

between Rt/Y and yield strength Y. Ratio of target resistance to

yield strength decreasing with increasing of yield strength, which
means lower value Y has larger contribution to Rt. Fig. 3 shows
an approximate linear relation between tensile strength and target
resistance. Tensile strength has a signicant inuence to target
resistance at lower yield strength. Compared with yield strength
of ceramic material, the tensile strength has limited contribution
to target resistance. Fig. 4 shows the relation of target resistance
and initial material porosity h0. It can be observed from Fig. 4 that
the ratio of the target resistance to yield strength sensitivity decreases with increases of initial porosity of ceramic material, especially for lower yield strength. It can be concluded that ceramic
material yield strength Y is the main factor which determines the
target resistance Rt. But as a brittle material, ceramic material easily fractures under impact loading. As the fracture toughness
improving (improving the tensile strength), it will change the size
of the elastic region, the cracked region and the comminuted region which ultimately affects Rt.
Using the static mechanical properties data of 95% alumina
ceramic and 10% ZTA ceramic material in Table 2, we can get the
dynamic parameters for cavity expansion theory based on compressible porous and powder ceramic material. Table 3 summarizes the results of calculations. It can be seen that with
improving of fracture toughness, the target resistance of 10% ZTA
higher than that of 95% alumina ceramic, and ratio of cavity size
to pulverized region size increases in 10% ZTA.
4. Ballistic characterization
In the ballistic tests shown schematically in Fig. 5, the ceramic
tiles backed by after-effect metal plate target were impacted by
tungsten LRP. Direct ballistic tests have been used to versify the

ballistic performance of 95% alumina ceramic and 10% ZTA ceramic. The depth of residual penetration in the after-effect target
was measured in each case. The depth of penetration (DOP) method is an efcient way to evaluate the anti-penetration ability [25],
which can easily get a dimensionless factor of ballistic
performance.
Following the denition in [26], ballistics performance is assessed by a dimensionless factor which combines the mass efciency and thickness efciency of the material. The thickness
protection coefcient Fs and mass protection coefcient Fm are
dened.

Fs

P ref  P res  d1
d2

Fm

Pref  Pres  d1  qref

d2  qc

10

where Pres is the residual penetration depth in after-effect target

and Pref is the penetration depth in target without ceramic tiles.
d1, d2 is the thickness of cover plate and ceramic tiles respectively.
qref, qc is density of after-effect target and ceramic tile.
5. Comparison ballistic test to tungsten long rod projectile
5.1. Experiment layout and ceramic target
Experiments were performed in a small arms range wherein
tungsten LRP was red using 25 mm ballistic gun, which is
1.37 m long and with riing twist of 7.5. It can used to re several
sub-types of ammunition such as armor piercing, high explosive
and tracer. In present test, the 25 mm ballistic gun was used to re
large velocity range of armor piercing n stabilized discarding

Cover plate

Epoxy resin

1949

Ceramic tile

After-effect
Target

Fig. 8. Photograph and conguration of ceramic target with after-effect target.

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X.F. Zhang, Y.C. Li / Materials and Design 31 (2010) 19451952

Table 5
Summary of depth of penetration experiments.
Projectile velocity (ms1)

Residual penetration
(mm)

Reference penetration
(mm)

Thickness protection
coefcient (Fs)

Mass protection
coefcient (Fm)

95% alumina ceramic

1192
1257
1372
1498

19
27.1
41.8
46.2

65.7*
81.9*
94.9*
117.3*

0.8740
1.0360
1.0020
1.3620

1.9361
2.2949
2.2196
3.0171

10% ZTA ceramic

1173
1273
1397
1520

16.5
26.3
32.3
37.3

64.3*
84.5*
95.1*
118.8*

0.8960
1.1040
1.1960
1.5700

1.8847
2.3222
2.5157
3.3023

Simulation results based on one experiment.

sabot (APFSDS), and the velocity is controlled by adjusting the

mass of propellant. Fig. 6 shows the experiment layout conguration in ballistics test. These projectiles were red at velocities ranging from 1100 to 1500 ms1. Time recording started as the LRP
arrived at the rst aluminum foil and stopped as it arrived the second aluminum foil, then the projectile velocity can be calculated
using V = T/Dt, where T is the distance of two aluminum foils,
and Dt is the value of time recorder. The velocities were measured
to an accuracy of 5 ms1. The tungsten long rod projectile has a
diameter of 7 mm, length of 110 mm and it weighs 51 g. Fig. 7
shows photographs of the tungsten LRP.
Ceramic tiles were backed by plates of medium steel, a commonly used grade of steel material, were used in the present experiments. The mechanical properties of the above steel targets and
tungsten long rod projectile are given in Table 4. Physical and
mechanical properties of the two types of ceramic material, used
in the current experiments, are given in Table 2. The ceramic titles
used were U100 mm in diameter with thickness of 10 and 20 mm.
The sizes of the ceramic tiles have been chosen in such a way as to
provide multi-layer protection effect, which is a common requirement in armor application. Ceramic tiles are multi-layer structures
which have three layers and the thickness of each layer is 20, 20
and 10 mm. These tiles were bonded into the after-effect target
with size of U135 mm in diameter with 152 mm in height as
shown in Fig. 8. At the entrance face of ceramic tiles there is a
3 mm thickness steel plate used as cover plate to intercept the
ceramic debris during the impact of the projectile, and between
the ceramic tiles and the cover plate is 2 mm thick of rubber to
conne the ceramic tiles in axial direction. Between ceramic tiles
and after-effect target in radial direction is lled with epoxy resin

to fasten the ceramic tiles. Six screws of U5 mm were used to x

the cover plate with the target.
6. Results and discussion
Long rod projectiles were red in the range of 11001500 ms1
to have four ballistic performance tests against targets with 10%
ZTA and 95% alumina ceramic tiles. The experimental results from
Table 5 are shown graphically in Figs. 9 and 10, which shows a plot
of the residual penetration Pres versus the impact velocity V for the

3.5

Fs of 95% alumina ceramic

Fs of 10% ZTA

3.0
Protection coefficient F

Ceramic

Fm of 95% alumina ceramic

Fm of 10% ZTA

2.5
2.0
1.5
1.0
1200

1300

1400

1500

v0/ m/s
Fig. 10. Protection coefcient against impact velocity.

50

Pres /10-3m

40

30

20

10

95% alumina ceramic

10% ZTA

0
1100

1200

1300

1400

1500

v0 /m/s
Fig. 9. Residual penetration depth against impact velocity.

Fig. 11. Comparison of numerical and experimental result at impact velocity of

1142 ms1.

X.F. Zhang, Y.C. Li / Materials and Design 31 (2010) 19451952

1951

Fig. 12. Photo of residual penetration in after-effect target.

two types of ceramic tiles and ballistic efciency Fs, Fm versus the
impact velocity V respectively. For each impact velocity, the depth
of penetration in the medium steel without ceramic tiles was computed using numerical simulation technology based on one experiment. Fig. 11 shows the comparison of simulation and
experimental result at impact velocity of 1142 ms1. Detail of the
simulation works can be found in Zhang [27].
Fig. 9 shows a nonlinear relation between the impact velocity
and residual penetration depth in after-effect target, and as impact
velocity increasing, the residual penetration increased slowly. This
is consistent with the hypothesis that the effective target resistance decreases as the impact velocity increases because the penetration velocity increases with impact velocity at same target
resistance, similar results were observed by Subramanian [28]. As
shown in Fig. 10, the thickness protection coefcients of two type
ceramic material are both less than 1.0 at lower impact velocity
(v0  1250 ms1) which means that the two types of ceramic tiles
have shows poor ballistic performance than that of medium steel.
The thickness protection coefcient increases with the impact
velocity increasing. The mass protection coefcient Fm is always
higher than 1.0 in impact velocity of 11001500 ms1 which
shows that ceramic materials have high value in armor protection
material at the same weight.
Fig. 10 shows the residual penetration depth in the after-effect
steel target against impact velocity of the projectile for different
type of ceramic tiles. From the results, it is observed that with impact velocity increasing, the residual penetration depth of the two
types of ceramic tiles increased. The curve in the case of 10% ZTA
ceramic tiles increases more slowly than that of 95% alumina ceramic, which means the penetration resistance of 10% ZTA ceramic
tiles is more than the penetration resistance of 95% alumina ceramic tiles, especially to higher velocity tungsten LRP. Similarly, Hagg
[7] studied the ballistic performance of toughened ceramic material at impact velocity of 1390 ms1. This limited number of experiment result performed on three layer ZTA ceramic tiles give a
further evidence of improving ballistic performance by increasing
fracture toughness for ceramic materials.

Due to high velocity impact, fracture ceramic material ejected

out and the diameter of the after-effect target has no difference
with that before impact. This means the ceramic tiles have stronger
radial direction conne effect than that of axial direction. Fig. 12
shows photographs of the residual penetration results in after-effect target for 10% ZTA and 95% alumina ceramic tiles at a comparable impact velocity. It is again observed that the depth of
penetration in the 95% alumina ceramic tiles is smaller than the
penetration depth in the 10% ZTA tiles of the same total thickness.
The main reasons for the enhanced penetration resistance of the
10% ZTA ceramic tiles is the reduced fractures when compare to
95% alumina ceramic. Due to their low density, high stiffness and
brittleness, the speed of longitudinal sound waves in ceramics is
generally of the order of 10 km/s. The damage caused in the ceramic structure due to the passage of the compressive shock wave
decreases the penetration resistance in ceramic structure. As the
fracture toughness improving, it will change the size of the elastic
region, the cracked region and the comminuted region which ultimately affects the target resistance.

7. Conclusions
Comparison ballistic performance has been performed on 95%
alumina ceramic tiles and 10% ZTA ceramic tiles. Combined inuence of yield stress, tensile strength and initial porosity to target
resistance has been analyzed based on cavity expansion theory of
Galanov. Ballistic tests were conducted on 95% alumina ceramic
tiles and 10% ZTA ceramic tiles based on the DOP method. Residual
penetration depth of two type ceramic tiles was studied, and ballistic efciency was determined. Results of the kinetic projectile
experiment show that the protection efciency factor increases
with projectile velocity increasing. With given thickness of the
ceramic tile, the protection efciency factor of 10% ZTA ceramic
tiles increase more quickly than that of 95% alumina ceramic tiles.
A signicant increasing in ballistic performance of ZTA ceramic tile
has been observed in our experiments. However, the mechanisms

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X.F. Zhang, Y.C. Li / Materials and Design 31 (2010) 19451952

of contribution of increasing the toughness fracture to ballistic performance could not be identied by limited number of ballistic
test. Further, well designed experiments and numerical models
would be necessary to quantify the role of toughened ceramic in
enhancing the penetration resistance of ceramic targets.
Acknowledgements
The researches are supported by the China National Natural Science Foundation (10632080) and China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (20060400731) and the Youth Scholarship Foundation of
Nanjing University of Science & Technology. The author would like
to thank Prof. Zhonghua Du (NJUST) and Prof. Peihui Shen (NJUST)
for their support and encouragement, and Dr. Xiaoning Zhao
(NJUST) for his experiment assistance.
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