BOOK ¨ REVIEW
e-EFM
K R Y Simha
Engineering Fracture Mechanics
K Ramesh
Published by IIT, Madras, Continuing Education Cell
Multimedia Book Series.
Distributed by Online Solutions India Pvt. Ltd.
We live in an increasingly fragmented world
of social, cultural, political, economical and
technological change. Instantaneous dissemi-
nation of information via satellites, optical
fibers and computer networks has swept away
archaic institutes and universities like a tsu-
nami. The languid pace of learning has been a
major cause for youngsters to drop out of
school and venture on their own. The dra-
matic drop in school enrollment all over the
world in direct contrast to a spectacular rise in
86
entrepreneurial youth population has come as
a rude jolt for senior academics and university
administrators. It is indeed both hilarious and
heartening to witness premier institutions vy-
ing with each other in luring students for
conducting research in mathematics, science,
medicine, agriculture and engineering. This
academic auction in the global knowledge
market leads to randomly and rapidly as-
sembled research groups headed by the high-
est rather than the brightest bidder. It is even
more ironical that our best young minds from
premier science, mathematics, medical and
engineering schools desert their disciplines
and enter desultory jobs upon receiving their
degrees. It is against this grim and grimy
backdrop that Professor Ramesh offers a new
beacon of hope for disillusioned teachers and
students by bringing out his maiden e-book on
fracture mechanics to motivate and stimulate
bright minds.
RESONANCE ¨ June 2007
 BOOK ¨ REVIEW
Tremendous effort and planning have gone
into the development of this first ever e-book
on engineering fracture mechanics (e-EFM)
to enable learning and teaching through gen-
erous use of pictures, tables, graphs and ani-
mations. The book is studded with nearly 700
colourfully illustrated slides requiring 1000
screen shots, 294 animations, 225 figures and
18 tables. Spread over 14 chapters e-EFM
begins with a historical overview of major
brittle fracture calamities pertaining to ships,
aircraft, tanks and bridges. Other examples of
failure of components like shaft, bolt, rail, etc.
highlight fundamental fracture modes and
mechanisms. The following three chapters
discuss Griffith-Irwin theory of LEFM (Lin-
ear Elastic Fracture Mechanics) leading to the
definition of SIF (Stress Intensity Factor) in
Chapter 5. Chapters 6 and 7 present theoreti-
cal, experimental and numerical methods for
SIF evaluation. Crack tip plasticity (Chapter
8) and J-integral (Chapter 12) provide a flavour
of nonlinear effects while Chapter 13 briefly
describes mixed mode fracture under com-
bined loading. Fracture toughness testing in
Chapter 9 delineates various specimen geom-
etries, R- curve and plane stress / plane strain
crack tip behaviour. Chapters 10 and 11 deal
with fatigue crack propagation and crack ar-
rest of great relevance to maintenance and
repair technology in vogue today in aircraft,
marine and bridge engineering. Finally, Chap-
ter 14 offers exercises and common examina-
tion questions for the benefit of teachers and
students.
Captivating photoelastic illustrations consti-
RESONANCE ¨ June 2007
tute a vivid part of the teaching and learning
theme throughout this e-book. Professor
Ramesh has taken full advantage of his expe-
rience and expertise in photoelasticity to em-
phasize basic principles underlying fracture
mechanics. This approach will certainly stimu-
late students to embrace experimental research.
Optical methods of engineering analysis have
witnessed a sudden spurt following photonics
revolution combining electronics and fiber
optics technologies. Photoelasticity furnishes
a rapid means for appraising elastic stress
fields dominated by the crack tip singularity.
Characterizing stress fields and quantifying
mixed mode stress intensity factors become
enormously simplified through photo-elastic-
ity. It is for this primary reason that the
photoelastic technique pioneered the growth
of experimental fracture mechanics. The meth-
ods of caustics and moiré interferometry have
lent additional admirable support to experi-
mental research. By including these tech-
niques, e-EFM is a worthwhile companion for
beginners of the subject of fracture. Fracture
of complex materials under dynamic electri-
cal, thermal and magnetic loading constitutes
the bulk of modern research published widely
in a variety of specialist journals from ortho-
paedics to earthquakes. It is precisely this
universal appeal of the subject that has sus-
tained the explosive growth of this field for
well over 60 years.
In many respects, fracture mechanics shares
many similarities with the subject of turbu-
lence which began with Taylor shortly after
he communicated Griffith’s landmark paper
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 BOOK ¨ REVIEW
on fracture to the Royal Society in 1921.
There was little progress on turbulence and
fracture research during the war years, but the
activity exploded in the aftermath and en-
gaged the attention of some of the greatest
twentieth century minds like Raman, Mott,
Heisenberg, Chandrashekar, Kolmogorov, von
Karman, Batchelor, Irwin, Westergaard and
de Gennes. Thus, studying fracture and turbu-
lence that began with Leonardo da Vinci over
500 years ago continued with Galileo, New-
ton, Hooke, Euler, Bernoullis, Navier, Stokes,
Lagrange, Maxwell, Airy, Hertz, Rayleigh,
Lamb, Love and Prandtl. Even today, fracture
and turbulence continue to inspire and chal-
lenge scientists, mathematicians and engi-
neers.
Modern cyberworld of internet, e-mail and i-
pod has unleashed an array of opportunities
and challenges for teachers and students alike.
In this respect, e-EFM by Ramesh is an im-
provement over the first generation of merely
attaching pdf/power point files. Now, sound
and animation make it possible to attach video
clips of fracture catastrophes recorded for
movies and documentaries. This could add
some thrill to the introductory historical over-
view (Chapter 1). Chapter and section num-
bers could also be added in the text, figures
and animations for easy reference. Wherever
possible, it would be helpful to cite journals
with hyperlinks in the slides to enable readers
to access the web online to get more informa-
tion. These features could be implemented in
the second version of e-EFM along with other
88
suggestions received from students and teach-
ers.
The glorious spirit of educating engineers
began with Timoshenko whose texts have
become evergreen classics in classrooms
across the world. His book on elasticity intro-
duced the photoelastic technique which was
perfected further by his student Frocht whose
student Srinath spurred the growth of experi-
mental mechanics in India by creating centres
of excellence at Kanpur, Bangalore and
Chennai, and authored many books to inspire
generations of students like Ramesh, who
coincidentally, has worked at Kanpur, Ban-
galore and Chennai. This great tradition of
teaching and training students through books
continues with Ramesh whose book on digital
photoelasticity has become a standard inter-
national reference.
I congratulate the author and IIT Madras au-
thorities for initiating a new trend in technical
education. I recommend that this maiden e-
EFM version be published immediately at an
affordable price. I strongly recommend e-
EFM to all engineering students and teachers;
and, to all educational and R&D organiza-
tions including engineering societies and pub-
lic libraries. Hope that more will come out of
IIT Madras e-books initiative (meaning aes-
thetic books with beautiful isochromatics as
in e-EFM!!).
K R Y Simha, Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012, India.
RESONANCE ¨ June 2007