International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 31 (2021) 963–974

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International Journal of Mining Science and Technology

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

Effects of confining pressure on acoustic emission and failure

characteristics of sandstone
Zhen Huang a,b, Qixiong Gu a, Yufan Wu a, Yun Wu b,⇑, Shijie Li c, Kui Zhao a, Rui Zhang d
a
School of Resources and Environment Engineering, Jiangxi University of Science and Technology, Ganzhou 341000, China
b
School of Earth Sciences and Engineering, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, China
c
School of Earth Sciences and Engineering, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
d
Kunming Survey, Design and Research Institute Co. Ltd. of CREEC, Kunming 650200, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In this study, uniaxial and triaxial compression acoustic emission (AE) tests were implemented to inves-
Received 8 April 2021 tigate the AE effect and failure characteristics of sandstone under different confining pressures (r3). The
Received in revised form 23 June 2021 evolution of AE parameters in the rock failure process and fracture fractal dimension characteristics after
Accepted 20 August 2021
failure were analyzed. The results revealed that the activity of the AE signal is strongly related to r3. The
Available online 30 August 2021
evolution of the Ib value can be divided into the I-fluctuation, II-stability, and III-decrease stages. In the
first stage, the Ib value of the AE was relatively high, and the AE energy was low. Then, the Ib value tended
Keywords:
to be stable; however, the fluctuation amplitude decreased, and the AE energy rapidly increased. In the
Sandstone
Acoustic emission
stage of decrease, the AE energy sharply increased before the load approached the peak value, and the Ib
Ib value value significantly decreased and dropped to the lowest point before the peak value. As r3 increased, the
Failure mode rock’s failure mode changed from tensile failure to shear failure and became more coordinated. As the
Fractal dimension confining pressure increased, the shape dimension decreased, and the order degree of rock failure
increased. The confining pressure exerted a certain control effect on the rock failure.
Ó 2021 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of China University of Mining & Technology. This is an open
access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1. Introduction ies have been carried out to understand the AE characteristics of

Construction disturbances in underground projects, such as
traffic, water conservancy tunnel excavation, hydrocarbon and coal
resources development, cause the development and expansion of
internal fissures in the surrounding rock. This results in the
decrease of the structural integrity and bearing capacity of the
rocks, which in turn greatly affects the stability of the project [1–
3]. Thus, it is of great importance to investigate the failure process
and damage characteristics of rocks subjected to loading [4].
Acoustic emission (AE) has attracted much attention from scholars
worldwide, because it can achieve the continuous non-destructive
detection of rock damage, and has been a popular research topic in
related fields. The AE information obtained for rock under stress
effectively reflects the evolution of micro-crack eruptions and
crack extension penetration inside the rock [5–7]. Currently, AE
signal analysis is performed by analyzing the characteristic param-
eters such as AE events, AE energy, ringing count, b value (param-
eter related to seismic activity characteristics) [8–11], fractal
dimension characteristics, and entropy values [12–14]. Many stud-
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: wy1562254170@163.com (Y. Wu).
rock failure processes. Eberhardt et al. [15] quantified the brittle
fracture damage of rocks according to the information of the AE
parameters before the peak stress. Song et al. [16] investigated
the characteristics of parameters such as the energy rate and
amplitude during the uniaxial compression of weakly cemented
sandstone. Zhang et al. [17] investigated the main frequency and
entropy change law of the AE signal during the destruction of
dry and water-saturated gangue. Gao et al. [18] studied the fractal
dimension characteristics of AE during the destruction of coal sam-
ples. Li et al. [19] and Li et al. [20] investigated the evolution law of
the b value of AE during the destruction of different rocks.
Rock damage is the process of initial crack development, expan-
sion, aggregation, connection, and penetration within the rock, and
has significant nonlinear characteristics, from internal microscopic
damage development to macroscopic fracture penetration [21].
Fractals involve the study of the intrinsic laws of nonlinear systems
and their unity of determinism and stochasticity [22–24], and their
ability to measure the self-similarity of seemingly random and
complex geometric contours at different angles and scales. Since
the concept of fractal geometry was formed in 1983 [25], it has
been applied to different degrees in the field of rock mechanics.
Scholars domestically and abroad have conducted many studies

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijmst.2021.08.003
2095-2686/Ó 2021 Published by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of China University of Mining & Technology.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Z. Huang, Q. Gu, Y. Wu et al. International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 31 (2021) 963–974

pling machine, a JKDQ-1 T intelligent rock sample cutting machine,

Fig. 1. Rock samples for tests.
from a fractal viewpoint to characterize the rock fracture, rough-
ness of rock joints surface, fracture morphology, pore space, and
other aspects [26–29], and various crucial research conclusions
have been proposed.
Because the rock damage process is very complex and involves
cross-scale processes, from microscopic to macroscopic, the pars-
ing relationship between macroscopic failure and microscopic
damage remains to be further studied. Additionally, the study of
rock damage must be carried out from multiple viewpoints and
in different directions. In this study, the evolution laws of the AE
event rate, accumulated AE events, Ib value, and other parameters
were investigated during the damage of yellow sandstone by con-
ducting compression tests on sandstone under different confining
pressure conditions, combined with AE monitoring technology.
The macroscopic morphology and fractal dimension characteristics
of rock fractures under different confining pressures were compre-
hensively analyzed to provide a useful theoretical reference for
practical engineering in sandstone formations.
2. Materials and test methods
2.1. Sample preparation
Yellow sandstone was obtained from Meishan, Sichuan Pro-
vince, China. Sandstone mainly consists of cuttings, feldspar,
quartz, good homogeneity, and dark yellow in the natural state.
Reducing the influence of specimen variability, the specimens were
obtained from a piece of intact rock. A TX-ZS200A drilling and sam-
and a JKSHM-200 double-sided stone grinding machine were used
to drill, cut, and polish the rock specimens to ensure that, after pro-
cessing, the dimensional accuracy and flatness of the two ends of
the specimens satisfied the recommendations of the International
Society of Rock Mechanics (ISRM). The size and precision of the rock
test were as follows: diameter D
length H = 50 mm
100 mm;
end parallelism  0.05 mm; height error  0.3 mm. The processed
rock specimens were placed in an oven under a constant tempera-
ture of 50 ℃, left to stand for 24 h, and then removed and number
after cooling (‘‘S” means the abbreviation of sandstone). The dimen-
sions, quality, and compressional wave velocity of the rock speci-
mens were measured. The specimens’ average density was 2.22 g/
cm3, and the compressional wave velocity was 1990–2681 m/s. A
rock specimen is shown in Fig. 1, and the physical and mechanical
parameters of the rock samples are listed in Table 1. Five sets of
sandstone samples were selected for nuclear magnetic resonance
(NMR) pore structure testing, and the results are shown in Fig. 2.
The NMR test results revealed that the average porosity of the five
sets of test sandstone samples was approximately 21%.
2.2. Experimental setup and testing procedure
The loading system used in the test is a GDS triaxial rheometer
produced in the United Kingdom (Fig. 3). This system comprises
three sets of supporting test systems for axial pressure, confining
pressure, and osmotic pressure and is equipped with software to
allow the effective operation of the test system. Moreover, the test
system has high precision and data measurement accuracy, and
can provide axial loads of 0–400 kN, confining pressures of 0–
32 MPa, and osmotic pressures of 0–32 MPa. The system is
equipped with a LVDT sensor, and can achieve the required mea-
surement accuracy under high-and low-pressure environments.
The AE test system uses the Micro-II Digital AE system developed
by Physical Acoustics Corporation (PAC). The AE sensor uses a
broadband UT-1000 sensor with a frequency range of 60–
1000 kHz, the threshold value of 35 dB, preamplifier threshold
value (gain) of 40 dB, and the waveform sampling rate of 2 MSPS
(a million samples per second). The peak definition time (PDT),
hit definition time (HDT), and hit lockout time (HLT) was set to
100, 150, and 300 ls, respectively. The test was conducted by
applying displacement loading, setting the axial loading rate to

Table 1
Physical and mechanical properties of the sandstones.

Specimen Diameter Height Mass Density P-wave Confining pressure, Elastic Deformation Peak Peak stress
No. (mm) (mm) (g) (g/cm3) velocity (m/s) r3 (MPa) modulus (GPa) modulus (GPa) strain (%) (MPa)
S-1 49.92 100.20 439.68 2.24 1996 2 80.60 61.80 1.72 106.12
S-2 50.20 100.20 436.62 2.22 2861 71.37 69.47 1.55 107.46
S-3 50.38 100.18 440.12 2.24 2457 77.35 55.67 1.48 82.28
S-4 49.90 100.20 436.88 2.22 2611 75.16 59.61 1.39 82.61
S-5 50.00 98.02 430.11 2.19 2346 4 84.87 73.92 1.49 110.29
S-6 50.06 97.66 427.98 2.18 2681 86.35 72.42 1.75 126.89
S-7 50.02 98.00 434.60 2.21 2466 84.15 73.20 1.77 129.70
S-8 49.82 98.40 437.83 2.23 2096 76.27 67.57 1.86 125.40
S-9 50.08 100.04 440.47 2.24 1955 6 85.60 73.98 1.74 128.40
S-10 50.40 100.20 438.27 2.23 2361
S-11 50.20 100.00 437.64 2.23 1990 89.19 74.04 1.97 145.94
S-12 49.90 100.30 439.18 2.23 2558 78.90 69.74 2.17 151.06
S-13 50.00 100.20 440.25 2.24 2378 8 86.33 84.57 1.86 157.18
S-14 50.10 100.20 440.43 2.24 2469 88.67 71.49 2.08 148.43
S-15 49.34 100.10 429.60 2.18 2381 79.83 72.14 2.28 164.23
S-16 49.36 100.02 427.50 2.17 1927
S-17 50.00 100.04 440.41 2.24 1903 0 122.00 72.90 0.82 59.95
S-18 49.16 99.48 434.16 2.21 2004 173.67 107.04 0.77 82.87
S-19 49.70 100.30 437.28 2.22 2463 164.88 93.80 0.81 76.35
S-20 50.00 100.00 433.51 2.20 2016 182.13 85.05 0.92 78.49

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0.4 compaction stage, linear elastic deformation stage, stable crack

extension stage (yield stage), and unstable extension stage (dam-
S-1 age stage). There are obvious differences between the stress and
S-2
strain curves of the uniaxial compression and triaxial compression.
0.3 S-3
S-4 For example, under uniaxial compression, there was an obvious
Porosity component (%)

S-5 compaction phase in the pre-loading period, whereas in the triaxial

compression test the compaction stage was not obvious and the
0.2 stress–strain curve exhibited an approximately linear relationship
before the peak stress, owing to the compaction of the primary
pores and cracks inside the rock induced by confining pressure.
Additionally, the degree of closure of the primary pore and the
0.1 cracks of the rock under different confining pressures was not
the same, and the compaction phase of the rock was not obvious
at the early stage of loading, owing to a certain compaction effect
exerted by the confining pressure on the initial fissure of the rock
0.1 1 10 100 1000 10000 before loading. The peak strength of the yellow sandstone also
T2 (ms) exhibited an obvious increasing trend with the increase of the con-
fining pressure. The peak strength of the yellow sandstone under
Fig. 2. Transverse relaxation time T2 spectrum curves of sandstone specimens. uniaxial compression was approximately in the range of 58–
80 MPa; the average peak strength was approximately
74.41 MPa, and the average peak strengths under the confining
0.002 mm/s, and setting the four confining pressure levels of 2, 4, 6,
pressure of 2–8 MPa were 94.61, 123.07, 141.79, and 156.61 MPa.
and 8 MPa in the following test procedures: (1) specimen prepara-
The elastic modulus (Et), deformation modulus (Es), and peak
tion and specimen installation; (2) pressure chamber filling and
strain are important parameters for describing the process of rock
pressurization; (3) AE sensor deployment and testing; and (4) axial
damage, including the deformation characteristics of the rock dam-
stress loading.
age process. The relationships between r3 and Et, Es, and peak
strain are analyzed below. The elastic modulus and deformation
3. Results and analysis modulus calculated under uniaxial compression has a large disper-
sion and deviate from linearity. Therefore, the uniaxial part of the
3.1. Analysis of sandstone compression test results relationship between Et, Es, and r3 is excluded. Fig. 5a shows the
relationship between Et of sandstone and r3. As can be seen, Et sig-
The stress–strain curves of the sample are presented in Fig. 4. It nificantly increased with r3, and an obvious linear relationship
can be found that the sandstone went through four stages during between the confining pressure and the modulus of elasticity
the uniaxial and triaxial compression: initial crack closure and was observed through the linear fitting, with the fitted correlation

Fig. 3. GDS triaxial testing apparatus.

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Z. Huang, Q. Gu, Y. Wu et al.
Fig. 4. Stress–strain curves of rock specimens under triaxial compression (r1 is the peak stress of the rock under differentconfining pressures, and r3 is the test confining
pressure of rock).
Fig. 5. Relationships between elastic and deformation moduli and confining pressure.
coefficient exceeding 0.99. The fitted equation for the elastic mod-
ulus is Et = 1.9064r3 + 72.6556 Et ¼ 19064r3 þ 72:6556and the fit-
ted correlation coefficient R2 = 0.9959. The mean elastic modulus of
the yellow sandstone increased from 76.5 to 87.6 GPa with the
increase of the test confining pressure from 2 to 8 MPa. Impor-
tantly, the effect of r3 on Et is related to the internal structure of
the rock. For the yellow sandstone, the increase of the confining
pressure contributed to the densification of internal defects, such
as pores and fissures inside the rock sample, to a certain extent,
and the limiting effect of the confining pressure increased the stiff-
ness of the rock to a certain extent. Thus, the elastic modulus of the
rock increased accordingly.
Fig. 5b shows the relationship between Es and r3. Similar to the
relationship between Et and r3, as r3 increased, the rock’s Es exhib-
ited an increasing trend, with a faster increase occurring in the
range of 2–4 MPa and a slower increase was occurring in the range
of 4–8 MPa, which indicates a tendency toward stabilization.
The fitting equation of the deformation modulus is Es =  0.
2614r23 + 4.8728r3 + 53.3732 and the fitting correlation coefficient
R2 = 0.9257. The average deformation modulus of the yellow sand-
stone increased from 62.5 to 75.6 GPa when r3 increased from 2 to
8 MPa. The effect of r3 on Es is essentially consistent with that of
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International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 31 (2021) 963–974
the elastic modulus. The increase of the confining pressure densi-
fied the internal fracture and pore structure of the rock, which
made the preliminary densification stage increasingly unobvious
and thus caused the increase of the deformation modulus. The test
results are essentially consistent with the test results obtained by
Zhao et al. [30].
The peak strain is the strain value corresponding to the time at
which the rock stress reached its peak. Fig. 6 shows the relation-
ship between the peak strain of the sandstone and r3. As shown
in Fig. 6, the law of peak strain variation is essentially consistent
with the law governing the variation of the modulus of elasticity
and deformation modulus with the variation of the confining pres-
sure. As the confining pressure increased, the peak strain exhibited
an increasing trend, the peak strain of the rock under the uniaxial
2-MPa condition was elevated, and the average peak strain value
ranged from 0.83 under the uniaxial condition to 1.53 under the
2-MPa condition. Then, as the test confining pressure increased
(0–8 MPa), the peak strain slowed down as the test envelope pres-
sure increased (0–8 MPa) and the peak strain only increased by
0.05, from 6 to 8 MPa. The fitting formula of the yellow sandstone
peak strain and confining pressure is e1 =  0.02r23 +
0.3059r3 + 0.8796, and the fitting correlation coefficient
Z. Huang, Q. Gu, Y. Wu et al.
Fig. 6. Relationship between the peak strain and confining pressure of sandstones.
Fig. 7. Relationship between peak strength of sandstones and confining pressure.
R2 = 0.9758. This indicates that the confining pressure had an obvi-
ous controlling effect on the deformation damage. As the confining
pressure increased, the rock deformation exhibited the characteris-
tics of transformation from the brittle state to plastic failure, and
the rock damage is strongly influenced by the stress state of the
rock.
Nowadays, the Mohr-Coulomb (MC) strength criterion is one of
the most widely used strength criteria. According to the MC, the
rock damage process is the result of the joint action of normal
stress and shear stresses. Thus, the MC can describe the damage
characteristics of brittle, plastic materials based on the assumption
that the intermediate principal stress does not affect the strength
of the rock, depending on whether the rock damage occurs when
the normal stress and shear stresses reach their ultimate value at
an interface within the rock [31]. The maximum shear force carried
by the rock can be determined by the cohesion and internal friction
angle; the MC criterion is expressed as follows:
sm ¼ c þ rtanu
where sm is the shear stress of rock material; c the cohesive force of
the rock material; r the normal stress at the breaking surface of the
rock material; and u the internal friction angle of the rock material.
In this study, the strength characteristics of sandstone under
different confining pressures were analyzed based on the MC,
International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 31 (2021) 963–974
and the MC expressed by the normal stress can be written as
follows:
r1 ¼ d þ kr3 ð2Þ
where k is the influence coefficient of the confining pressure on the
axial carrying capacity; d the theoretical uniaxial compressive
strength of the rock material; r1 the peak stress of the rock under
different confining pressures; and r3 the test confining of rock.
Eq. (2) was used to fit the relationship between the peak stress
of the rock and r3, as shown in Fig. 7. Additionally, it can be seen
that the equation fitting correlation coefficient is R2 = 0.9883,
which indicates a high degree of fitting, and that the MC can better
describe the damage variation law of yellow sandstone. The fitting
results of the MC for yellow sandstone is k = 10.5794, d = 75.781
8 MPa, and the fitting equation is r1 = 10.5794r3 + 75.7818.
3.2. Analysis of acoustic emission test results
3.2.1. Acoustic emission event rate
The AE frequency, amplitude, and other related parameters of
crack development and expansion in rocks at different stages of
stress damage have obvious differences, and the AE characteristics
at different stages contain important information on the rock dam-
age process. In this study, the AE characteristics during the damage
of rocks under different confining pressures were analyzed using
the AE event rate and cumulative AE event number, which reflect
the frequency and total amount of AE signals, respectively. The
evolution of the AE event rate and cumulative AE events in sand-
stone under different confining pressures is shown in Fig. 8.
It can be found from Fig. 8 that the stress curves and AE counts
of the rocks under different confining pressures exhibit similar
variation characteristics. At the early stage of loading, only a few
of AE events occurred in the initial densification stage of the rocks
under different confining pressures, because the AE signal at the
early stage of loading was mainly generated by the closure and
densification process of the initial cracks inside the rocks, which
released a small amount of transient elastic waves under the action
of compression and friction. However, the overall decreasing trend
of the AE event rate with the increase of r3 indicates the direct
relationship of the AE event rate with r3. As the axial load
increased, the compaction stage ended and the linear elastic stage
began to form. At this stage, the stress–strain curve was approxi-
mately linear, and the rock specimen mainly underwent elastic
deformation. The external load was not sufficient for forming
new microcracks in the rock specimen, the AE event rate and the
cumulative number of AE events were in a relatively stable state,
and the cumulative number of AE events exhibited a relatively
stable period of increase. After the end of the linear elastic stage,
the yellow sandstone began to enter the plastic deformation stage.
At this stage, the new microcracks inside the sample began to
increase and eventually penetrated and connected to each other
to form macroscopic cracks as the number and size of microcracks
increased. Additionally, the overall rock rupture exhibited an
unstable development stage wherein the AE activity entered the
active stage, and the AE event rate and cumulative AE events
appeared to surge (Fig. 8). Before the axial load approached the
peak, the AE event rate surged to the peak, as shown in Fig. 8. By
the time that the axial load peaked, the rock sample had com-
pletely lost its bearing capacity, and the AE event rate appeared
ð1Þ to increase to a certain extent. Overall, the AE activity of rocks in
the initial pressure-density stage and the elastic stage was rela-
tively calm, and the AE signal was mainly generated by the closure
of the initial fissure and the sprouting of a small number of micro-
cracks. The active degree of the AE signal in the initial pressure-
density stage is strongly related to r3, and the increase in r3 sup-
pressed the active degree of the AE signal in the initial pressure-
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Fig. 8. Variation of stress and AE events of sandstone under different confining pressures.

density stage to a certain extent. In the plastic stage, microfrac-
tures within the rock sprouted, developed, expanded, and con-
nected to produce macroscopic cracks [32–34]. Additionally, the
AE activity entered the active stage, and the AE event rate and
cumulative AE events appeared to surge.
3.2.2. Analysis of Ib value of acoustic emission
In 1944, Gutenberg et al. [35] analyzed the pattern between the
earthquake frequency and the earthquake magnitude and pro-
posed the concept of using the value of the b parameter to describe
the proportion of the focal dimension distribution. Since then, the b
value has been widely used as important prior information for
earthquakes by researchers in the field of seismic activity and haz-
ard assessment. The mechanism of the rock damage process under
and means that the rock material is in the macrofracture expansion
state. When the b value stably changes with a small change ampli-
tude, this shows that the specimen is in a more stable and progres-
sive fracture expansion state. However, because the b value was
originally defined in seismology, various application problems
emerge when it is directly introduced into the AE signals of engi-
neering materials. Hence, Shiotani et al. [38] proposed an ‘‘im-
proved b value”, namely, the Ib value, which is more applicable
to the analysis of the AE signals of rock and concrete materials.
The formula for calculating the Ib value is expressed as follows:
Z 1
nðaÞda ¼ b ð3Þ
0
Z 1

stress is similar to that of earthquake occurrence, and the acoustic Nðw1 Þ ¼ Nðl  a2 eÞ ¼ nðaÞda ð4Þ
la2 e
signal generated by rock damage is also defined as microseismic
activity. Therefore, Mogi [36] and Scholz [37] introduced b values Z 1
into the field of rock engineering based on AE monitoring technol- Nðw2 Þ ¼ Nðl þ a1 eÞ ¼ nðaÞda ð5Þ
ogy, and used the correlation between the magnitude of the AE sig- l þ a2 e
nal’s amplitude and the fracture scale to replace the earthquake
magnitude in the original calculation equation with the AE signal log10 Nðw1 Þ  log10 Nðw2 Þ
Ib ¼ ð6Þ
amplitude. Thus, they investigated the change of the internal ða1 þ a2 Þe
microfracture scale during the force damage of rocks by consider-
ing the b value characteristics of AE. Generally, it is thought that where n(a) denotes the cumulative AE events about a; b a certain
the increase of the b value reflects an increase in the proportion number of AE events, where b in the range of 50–100 is considered
of small-scale events, which indicates the dominance of small- as a suitable value for fitting the Gutenburg-Richter formula [38];
scale fracture development and expansion within the rock material a1 and a2 the constants; l and e the statistical mean value and stan-
and means that the rock material is in the stable state of microfrac- dard deviation of amplitudes, respectively; w1 and w2 the sublayer
ture expansion. The decrease of the b value reflects an increase in and upper amplitudes, respectively; and N(w1) and N(w2) the cumu-
the proportion of large-scale events, which indicates the domi- lative number of the upper layer and sublayer amplitudes,
nance of large-scale fracture expansion within the rock material respectively.
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Z. Huang, Q. Gu, Y. Wu et al.
In this study, equal time intervals were used to calculate the AE
Ib value of the damage process of the rock under different confin-
ing pressures with 6 s as the time interval, according to the above
Ib value calculation formula. The change law of the AE Ib value for
the damage process of yellow sandstone under different confining
pressures is shown in Fig. 9. It can be seen from Fig. 9 that during
the stress damage of rock with r3, the Ib values exhibit a similar
variation law, which can be separated into three stages: I-
fluctuation, II-stability, and III-decrease.
In the fluctuation stage (stage I), the AE Ib value fluctuated
upward and downward as the load increased. The range of upward
and downward fluctuation was large, and the Ib maintained a rel-
atively high value mainly because the rock was in the crack com-
pression and linear elastic stage at the beginning. Additionally,
the primary microcrack and pore structure inside the rock was in
the process of densification and closure, and the AE signal in this
stage was generated by the densification of the primary microcrack
and pore structure, which corresponds to small-scale fracture
change. Hence, the Ib fluctuated upward and downward and had
a high value. In this stage, the AE energy was low, and had good
synchronization with the fluctuation stage of the Ib value. The
comparison of different confining pressure conditions reveals that
there existed some variability in the change of the Ib value at the
initial stage of loading. The stage without the Ib value appeared
at the initial stage of loading under the 8-MPa condition, owing
to the effect of the higher r3. This produced the initial compression
density of the microfracture and pore structure inside the rock
before loading, and resulted in the stage without the AE signal at
the initial stage of loading, which was then used to obtain the cal-
culation results without the Ib value. As the confining pressure
increased, the AE Ib value exhibited more upward and downward
fluctuation, and the Ib value fluctuated in the range of 0.04–0.20
at 8 MPa, but remained within 0.04–0.12 at 2 MPa, which is similar
Fig. 9. Variation of Ib value of sandstones under different confining pressures.
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International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 31 (2021) 963–974
to the calculation results obtained by Zhang et al. [39] for the AE b
value of rock under different confining pressures. The fluctuation of
the Ib value at the early stage of loading is strongly influenced by
the compaction effect of the confining pressure. Owing to the ini-
tial confining pressure, the microfractures inside the rock material
appeared to undergo densification, and microfractures with a rela-
tively larger size were more likely to densify under the action of
the confining pressure. As the confining pressure increased, the
densification of the rock material by the confining pressure became
more significant, which in turn led to the larger fluctuation of the
Ib value at the early stage of loading as r3 increased.
As the axial load increased, the Ib value entered the stable
stage (stage II) and gradually stabilized, the fluctuation range
gradually decreased, and a relatively gentle stage appeared
before the Ib value decreased. However, the AE energy appeared
to rapidly increase, which reflects that the rock material was in a
more stable progressive microfracture expansion state corre-
sponding to the stage of stable crack expansion in the process
of rock force damage. At this stage, the internal fracture of the
rock was in the stable expansion state; therefore, the Ib value
remained relatively stable and the AE energy was in the increas-
ing stage.
As the axial load kept increasing, the Ib value entered the
decreasing stage (stage III), and the AE energy exhibited an obvious
surge at this stage, which reflects the further development, connec-
tion, and penetration of the small fissures that developed inside
the rock toward forming larger fissures. At this stage, the AE signal
was mainly generated by the expansion of larger fissures, which
produced higher-energy AE, and the Ib value appeared to decrease.
When the axial load approached closer to the peak intensity, the
fissures inside the rock material further expanded to form macro-
scopic penetration fissures, and the Ib value dropped to the
minimum.
Z. Huang, Q. Gu, Y. Wu et al. International Journal of Mining Science and Technology 31 (2021) 963–974

Fig. 10. Failure modes of sandstone under different confining pressures.

Fig. 11. Digital image process of rock fracture planes.

4. Failure characteristics of sandstone

4.1. Failure modes

After the test was completed, the rock specimens that had
deformed and became damaged under different confining pres-
sures were removed from the pressure chamber. The heat shrink
tube and sensors on the surface were removed, and the damaged
rock samples were processed and analyzed. To compare and inves-
tigate the differences in the rock rupture characteristics under con-
fining pressure and without confining pressure, a uniaxial
compression test (r3 of 0 MPa) was conducted on the yellow sand-
stone. The failure patterns of the rock specimens obtained under
different confining pressures are shown in Fig. 10. As can be seen,
when r3 was 0 MPa, the rock was mainly in the form of brittle ten-
sile damage, the rock surface exhibited multiple vertical penetra-
tion fissures, and the fissure surfaces at the middle of the
specimen were more densely distributed and intersected with each
other. The central fissure intersection exhibited a slight decrease,
the overall shape of the block was cut, the specimen fractured,
and the middle of the specimen exhibited certain dilatancy. When
r3 was 2 MPa, the crack density on the surface of the specimen was
significantly reduced, the cracks were mainly 3–5 through cracks,
and the specimen did not exhibit central dilation. When r3 was
4 MPa, the main fractures in the specimen consisted of a single
shear surface fracture and one vertical through the fracture, and
the middle of the vertical through fracture was connected to
several secondary fractures. When the confining pressure was Fig. 12. Grayscale image of the fracture surface of sandstones.

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Fig. 13. Relationship between lgN(A) and lgr of rocks under different confining pressures.

8 MPa, two single shear surfaces appeared on the surface of the shear surface further increased with respect to 6 MPa. As can be
specimen. The two shear surfaces penetrated each other, which seen, the uniaxial conditions of the sandstone were mainly domi-
divided the rock specimen into two parts, and the angle of the nated by brittle tensile damage. The main fractures were mainly

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Table 2
Summary of the value of the fitting parameters.

Specimen No. Confining pressure, r3 (MPa) Fitting relationship R2 Fractal dimension, D

S-1 2 y =  1.27x + 1.2191 0.9936 1.27
S-2 y =  1.36x + 1.2222 0.9887 1.36
S-4 y =  1.28x + 1.0900 0.9931 1.28
S-5 4 y =  1.26x + 1.6540 0.9932 1.26
S-6 y =  1.25x + 1.3765 0.9882 1.25
S-8 y =  1.27x + 1.1910 0.9940 1.27
S-9 6 y =  1.19x + 1.3580 0.9909 1.19
S-11 y =  1.23x + 1.3410 0.9914 1.23
S-12 y =  1.25x + 1.2073 0.9947 1.25
S-13 8 y =  1.22x + 1.2433 0.9943 1.22
S-14 y =  1.21x + 1.0050 0.9976 1.21
S-15 y =  1.31x + 1.1592 0.9943 1.31
S-18 0 y =  1.37x + 0.9282 0.9977 1.37
S-19 y =  1.39x + 1.1091 0.9938 1.39
S-20 y =  1.40x + 1.0900 0.9938 1.40

vertical through fractures, and the middle of the vertical fractures
was connected to several secondary fractures with an obvious cen-
tral dilation. As the confining pressure increased, the yellow sand-
stone gradually exhibited typical shear damage, and the main
fractures of the specimens formed gradually from single shear frac-
tures. Additionally, the number and density of the fractures exhib-
ited a decreasing trend with r3, and the dip angle of the single
shear fractures exhibited a small increase as the confining pressure
increased. This is consistent with the results obtained by scholars
such as Mogi [40].
4.2. Fractal dimension characteristics of post-failure rocks
The box-counting dimension is gradually becoming one of the
main methods for calculating the fractal dimension, owing to its
benefit of being able to accurately and easily measure the fractal
dimension of self-similar images [22]. The method of calculating
the box-counting dimension entails covering the curves with frac-
tal dimension characteristics consisting of squares (shapes) or
boxes with different side lengths r. The number of boxes N(A) with
different side length r covering the curves with the fractal dimen-
sion is recorded, and the slope of the (lgr, lgN(A)) distribution
points is calculated from the relationship between Nr(A) and its
corresponding squares (shapes) or boxes. Thus, the corresponding
fractal dimension was estimated, and the calculation formula is
given as follows:
Table 2, it can be seen that the correlation coefficients calculated
in the figure are higher than 0.98, which indicates that the fracture
surfaces, which formed by the force damage of the sandstone
under different surrounding pressures, have obvious fractal dimen-
sion characteristics.
Fig. 14 presents the variation of the surface fractal dimension
(D) of the fractured rock samples under different confining pres-
sures. As can be seen, the fractal dimension of the fracture surface
fluctuated in the range of 1.35–1.42 with an average value of
approximately 1.39 at 0 MPa. At 2 MPa, D exhibited an obvious
decreasing trend with an average value of approximately 1.30. At
4 MPa, D fluctuated in the range of 1.25–1.30 with an average value
of 1.26. Compared with D at 0, 2, and 4 MPa, D at 6 and 8 MPa
decreased further. Therefore, within a certain confining pressure
range, the fractal dimension of the damaged rock sample’s surface
tended to decrease as r3 increased, and the calculated fractal
dimension is essentially consistent with the macroscopic damage
results and similar to the findings of Zhou et al. [41]. Because the
fractal dimension is a parameter used to characterize the degree
of order and disorder of a nonlinear system, as the fractal dimen-
sion increases, the system’s degree of disorder increases. Similarly,
a smaller fractal dimension value indicates a higher degree of order
in the system. Hence, it is understood that as r3 increases, the
orderly degree of rock damage exhibits an increasing trend. That
is, the confining pressure exerts a certain controlling effect on
the rock damage pattern.

lgNðAÞ
D ¼  lim ð7Þ
r!0 lgr
where N(A) is the number of boxes in the fractal dimension; and r
the side length of the box.
First, a translucent copy paper (with the same size as the sur-
face of the specimen) was wrapped around the surface of the dam-
aged specimen, and a sketch pencil was used for tracing along the
fracture surface of the rock sample. Subsequently, a scanner was
used to scan the finished copy paper and convert the image of
the fracture morphology of the copy paper into a picture file
(Fig. 11a). Fig. 12 shows the gray-level image of the fracture surface
morphology of a typical rock sample. The image file was imported
into a MATLAB binarization program that was developed to con-
vert the fracture surface morphology image from a gray-level
image to a binary image, as presented in Fig. 11b, and the logical
data from the binarization process were converted into binary data
to be used in the calculation of the fractal dimension. Thus, the bin-
ary data of the fracture surface morphology were extracted. The
lgN(A)-lgr curves of various typical rock samples and the fitting
equations are shown in Fig. 13 and Table 2. The slope of the curve
is the fractal dimension of the fracture surface. From Fig. 13 and Fig. 14. Relationship between fractal dimension and different confining pressures.

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5. Conclusions
In this study, an AE test on the compression damage process of
rocks was carried out under different confining pressures using a
typical yellow sandstone found in southwest China. The evolution
law of the AE events and Ib values during the damage process was
investigated, and the macroscopic damage characteristics and fis-
sure fractal dimension characteristics of the rocks were analyzed
under different confining pressures. The main conclusions can be
drawn as follows:
(1) At the initial compaction stage, the active degree of the AE
signal is closely related to the confining pressure. The change
characteristics of the Ib value can be divided into three stages,
namely, the I-fluctuation, II-stability, and III-decrease stages.
In the fluctuation stage, the Ib value of the AE fluctuates upward
and downward with the increase of the load, and the Ib value of
the AE remains relatively high, while the AE energy is low. In
the stability stage, the Ib value tends to stabilize, and the fluctu-
ation amplitude decreases, while the AE energy appears to
increase rapidly. Before the load approaches the peak stress,
the AE energy exhibits a significant surge. In this phase, the Ib
value exhibits a significant decline and decreases to the mini-
mum before the peak stress.
(2) As r3 increases, the damage form of sandstone transforms
from predominantly tension-type damage to predominantly
shear-type damage, and the number of fissures continues to
decrease.
(3) The fractal dimension of the damaged sandstone’s surface
decreases as r3 increases. As the confining pressure within a
certain range increases, the orderly degree of sandstone damage
exhibits an increasing trend, and r3 exerts a certain controlling
effect on the rock damage pattern.
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support from
the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41702326),
the Jiangxi Provincial Natural Science Foundation (No.
20202ACB214006), the Innovative Experts, Long-term Program of
Jiangxi Province (jxsq2018106049), the Supported by Program of
Qingjiang Excellent Young Talents, Jiangxi University of Science
and Technology, and the Innovation Fund Designated for Graduate
Students of Jiangxi Province (YC2020-S451).
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