International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

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International Journal of Mechanical Sciences

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Predicting ductility of Mg/SiCp nanocomposite under multiaxial loading

conditions based on unit cell modeling
Xu He a,b,d,∗, Shutao Song d, Xi Luo a,b, Jinling Liu a,b, Linan An c, Yuanli Bai d,∗
a
State Key Laboratory of Traction Power & School of Mechanics and Engineering, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu, Sichuan, 610031, China
b
Applied Mechanics and Structure Safety Key Laboratory of Sichuan Province, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu, Sichuan, 610031, China
c
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida, 32816, USA
d
Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida, 32816, USA

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

Keywords: This work presents an investigation on the ductility of Mg/SiCp under nine different multiaxial loading conditions
Magnesium matrix nanocomposites based on a unit cell (or called representative volumetric element, RVE) finite element model. The constitutive
Ductility relationship of magnesium matrix is characterized by a model combined Lode angle dependent plasticity model
Unit cell model
with the CPB06 plasticity model, which is able to describe the tension-compression asymmetry in magnesium
matrix. The debonding of the matrix-particle interface and matrix fracture are considered by the modified Mohr-
Coulomb (MMC) fracture model. Simulation results show that the interface debonding and subsequent matrix
fracture are responsible for the ductility and fracture of nanocomposite. The computational results with para-
metric studies are compared and well correlated with experimental data, and it finally gives a stress-based full
fracture locus of Mg/SiCp nanocomposite.

1. Introduction
Metal matrix nanocomposites (MMNCs) are of great potential for
widespread engineering applications because of their better mechanical
properties such as specific stiffness and specific strength than pure met-
als or alloys. SiC nanoparticle reinforced magnesium (Mg) matrix com-
posite is the representative one of them [1-4]. Usually adding ceramic
particles to the metal matrix is able to improve material strength but
reduces the ductility of the resultant composite as expected [5], which
has been a primary dilemma in material science for designing structural
materials [6]. In addition, recent researches discovered that metal ma-
trix composites exhibited different ultimate strength and ductility under
various loading conditions. Smirnov et al. [7] experimentally studied the
plastic behavior of AlMg6/SiC composites. It was found that that com-
posite showed higher initial compressive yield strength than initial ten-
sile yield strength. Wang et al. [8] reported that a metallic glassy com-
posite also had better strength in compression than tension at elevated
temperatures. Tekumalla et al. [9] and Sahoo et al. [10] confirmed that
it was more ductile in compression than tension for Mg matrix compos-
ites, respectively. The two main reasons for this tricky phenomenon may
be concluded as following: (1) the mechanical properties of the matrix
metal under different loading conditions are asymmetric, which comes
from the different deformation micro-mechanisms of hexagonal close
packed (HCP) metals [11,12]; (2) the processing of composites results
in microstructure defects such as micro voids, micro cracks, undesirable
interface reaction and so on [13,14]. These two factors are crucial for
the overall mechanical properties but difficult to control. Therefore, it
is necessary to predict the plastic and fracture behaviors accurately for
metal matrix nanocomposites when they go into further application.
In order to analyze the mechanical properties of metal matrix com-
posite quantificationally, a large amount of numerical methods has
been proposed. Hansen et al. [15] studied the texture evolution of
Cu/Nb layered composites during rolling. Brach et al. [16] investi-
gated the hydrostatic strength of nanoporous materials by character-
izing the limit state of a hollow sphere undergoing isotropic loading
conditons. Zhang et al. [17] utilized a cohesive zone model to charac-
terize the rate-dependent constitutive behavior of metal matrix com-
posites. Their results also showed the asymmetry of strength under ten-
sion and compression. Bonfoh et al. [18] performed numerical analysis
on the elastic-plastic behavior of metal matrix composites undergoing
ductile fracture. Influences of particle size and yield surface evolution
on the stress-strain response were analyzed. Long et al. [19] studied
the strengthening mechanisms of copper/carbon nanotube (Cu/CNT)
nanocomposites using 2D axial symmetric unit cell models. It demon-
strated that the aspect ratio of CNT affected the plastic flow of cop-
per significantly. He et al. [20] predicted the strength and ductility of

∗
Corresponding authors at: Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida, 32816, USA.
E-mail addresses: hexu713@163.com (X. He), bai@ucf.edu (Y. Bai).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijmecsci.2020.105831
Received 13 December 2019; Received in revised form 8 May 2020; Accepted 25 May 2020
Available online 30 May 2020
0020-7403/© 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

Fig. 1. (a)Typical microstructure of Mg/SiC nanocomposites is exhibited by SEM observation, the white arrows indicate the SiC particle or its clusters; (b) Schematic
illustration of a unit cell model divided into three parts named particle, interface and matrix, respectively. The right subfigure shows a zoom-in view of RVE model.

Fig. 2. Fracture modeling methods have differ-

ent resolution qualities for strain and stress do-
mains. Brittle fracture has better resolution in
stress domain while ductile fracture has bet-
ter resolution in strain domain. The test results
showing two different failure modes (both brit-
tle fracture and ductile fracture) of Mg/SiCp
composites are also illustrated in the plot.
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al.
Fig. 3. (a) Plane stress yield loci of CPB06 plasticity model [37] corresponding
to k = 0.3 and k = -0.3; (b) The influence of different parameter k and a on the
asymmetric yield strength between tension and compression. Larger a indicates
higher asymmetric ranges. As k increases the strengh ratio 𝜎 T /𝜎 C increases.
aluminum based nanocomposites by a bimodal numerical model. How-
ever, the strategy of taking crack density into account to predict ductility
of composites was not well understood yet. Josyula et al. [21] devel-
oped FE models to study the effect of particle distribution on the cut-
ting process of Al/TiC composites. Previous experiments and simulations
studied by Qiao et al. [22] demonstrated that there exists both brittle
fracture and ductile fracture in Mg/SiCp nanocomposites under differ-
ent loading conditions. Mayeur et al. [15] studied the effect of interface
affected zone on the stability of Cu/Nb composites by a crystal plastic-
ity model. All the studies mentioned above showed that the plasticity
and fracture behaviors of metal matrix composites were extraordinarily
complicated. Namely, accurate calibrating or predicting a full fracture
locus of metal matrix composites becomes progressively more important
as the growing demands of engineering applications, especially for Mg
matrix composites due to the complex plasticity and fracture properties
of magnesium [11,12,23,24].
Both 2D and 3D unit cell finite element models have been extensively
employed to investigate the mechanical behaviors of metal matrix com-
posites [19,25-28]. However, most of previous studies were focused on
International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831
predicting material plastic behaviors for varied geometry of inclusions
with different volume fraction and the quality of interface as well. In the
present work, the strategy of unit cell modelling extends to predict the
fracture behaviors of composites. According to the microstructure fea-
tures of Mg/SiCp nanocomposite, a unit cell model (illustrated in Fig. 1)
contains three fundamental different parts: particle, metal matrix and
interface. The geometrical size of a unit cell can be determined using
the following equation [29]:
( )
1
𝜆=𝑑 −1 (1)
1∕3
𝑓𝑣
where 𝜆 is the inter-particle spacing, d is the size of particle and fv is the
volume fraction of particles.
Besides, the size of interface also needs to be determined. Experi-
mental and theoretical observations indicated that there is an enhanced
zone of geometrically necessary dislocations (GNDs) arising from the
mismatch of thermal expansion coefficient (CTE) in the interface be-
tween the matrix and particle [30,31]. Furthermore, many enhanced
continuum models were proposed to investigate the strengthening and
failure of metal matrix composites by defining a GNDs zone [32-34].
All of them demonstrated that introducing the GNDs zone was crucial
to well describe the mechanical behaviors of metal matrix composites.
Shibata et al. [33] proposed a series of equations based on the Eshelby
inclusion theory to calculate the size of GNDs zone.
The geometry parameters of the unit cell model can thus be entirely
determined according to the material properties (e.g. size, volume frac-
tion, CTE and etc) of matrix and reinforcement. It is worth noting that
the GNDs’ contribution to the strengthening effect can be neglected if
the size of particle is smaller than a critical size [35,36]. We thus argued
the existence of GNDs zone in our previous paper [3].
For the Mg/SiCp composites, we employ the CPB06 plasticity model
[37] to consider the yield strength asymmetry between tension and com-
pression in Mg matrix. However, CPB06 yield criterion is not convenient
to describe the evolution of yield surface under subsequent plastic defor-
mation. Therefore, PPL plasticity model [38] is combined with CPB06 to
overcome this problem. The PPL model demonstrated that an arbitrary
stress state can be formulated in terms of two dimensionless parameters:
stress triaxiality 𝜂 and Lode angle parameter 𝜃, ̄ which are defined by,
𝜎𝑚
𝜂= (2)
𝜎̄
√
where 𝜎𝑚 = 13 (𝜎1 + 𝜎2 + 𝜎3 ), 𝜎̄ = 1
2
[ ( 𝜎1 − 𝜎2 )2 + (𝜎2 − 𝜎3 )2 + (𝜎3 − 𝜎1 )2 ].
[( ) ]
2 𝑟 3
𝜃̄ = 1 − arccos (3)
𝜋 𝜎̄
where r is the third invariant of the deviatoric stress tensor [S] = [𝜎]−
𝜎 m [I] and
[ ]1∕3 [ ]1∕3
27 27 ( )( )( )
𝑟= det ([𝑆 ]) = 𝜎 − 𝜎𝑚 𝜎2 − 𝜎𝑚 𝜎3 − 𝜎𝑚 (4)
2 2 1
Additionally, a power function is introduced to simulate the plastic
strain hardening in the PPL plasticity framework. This combined CPB06
and PPL plasticity model was implemented to Abaqus/Explicit as a ma-
terials user subroutine (VUMAT) to conduct the 3D unit cell model sim-
ulations.
The coexistence of brittle fracture and ductile fracture in MMNCs was
characterized by stress-based modified Mohr-Coulomb (MMC) model
because the resolution of stresses is much better than that of strains in
brittle materials as explained in Fig. 2 [39]. In this paper, the emphases
are put on predicting the fracture behavior of Mg/SiCp nanocomposite
under different loading conditions and the 3D unit cell model gives a full
fracture locus expressed by stress-based MMC model. The process of ma-
terial developing was showed in our previous papers, referring to [2-5].
Finally, good correlation results are achieved between the predictions
and the experiments under different loading conditions.
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

Fig. 4. (a) The influence of the value of a on the asymmtry of the transferred CPB06-PPL plasticity model. (b) The influence of the value of k on the asymmtry of the
transferred CPB06-PPL plasticity model. (c) Comparison between tests and transferred CPB06-PPL plasticity model used in this work. (d) Function a(𝜀p ) and k(𝜀p ),
which provide the hardening curve with increasing 𝜀p .

Table 1 where Si , i = 1,…,3 are the principal values of the stress deviator. a and
Material properties of SiC particles. k are two material parameters to describe the asymmetry of strength
Parameter Symbol value between tension and compression, and F gives the size of the yield lo-
cus. Indeed, according to the CPB06 yield criterion Eq. (5), the ratio of
Density 𝜌P 3.21 g/cm3
tension (𝜎 T ) to compression (𝜎 C ) yield strength was written by
Young’s modulus EP 427 GPa
Passion’s ratio 𝜈P 0.17
( )𝑎 ( )𝑎 𝑎1
Volume fraction in Mg/SiC VP 10% ⎧ 2 1 ⎫
Diameter dP 50 nm 𝜎𝑇 ⎪ 3 ⋅ (1 + 𝑘) + 2 ⋅ 3
⋅ (1 − 𝑘) ⎪
= ⎨( )𝑎 ( )𝑎 ⎬ (6)
𝜎𝐶 ⎪ 2
⋅ (1 − 𝑘) + 2 ⋅ 3 ⋅ (1 + 𝑘) ⎪
1
⎩ 3 ⎭

As an example, Fig. 3 shows the effects of k and a on the yield loci

2. Finite element unit cell modeling and material models corresponding to Eqs. (5) and (6). Furthermore, we can express the de-
viatoric principal stresses of Eq. (5) in terms of the effective stress 𝜎̄ and
2.1. Converting CPB06 plasticity model to a ode angle dependent plasticity Lode angle 𝜃 according to the transferring equation provided in [39],
model see Eq. (7).

⎧ 2
In this work, we consider the SiC particle as an isotropic and purely ⎪𝑆1 = 3 𝜎̄ cos 𝜃( )
elastic part because the SiC particle is so small (50 nm) that it barely ⎪ 2 2
⎨𝑆2 = 3 𝜎̄ cos ( 3 𝜋 − 𝜃 ) (7)
fractures, see Fig. 9a. The material properties of SiC are presented in ⎪ 2 4
Table 1. As reported by Wang and Wu [11,12], magnesium shows a sig- ⎪𝑆3 = 3 𝜎̄ cos 3 𝜋 − 𝜃
⎩
nificant tension-compression asymmetry in both yield and plastic flow.
In order to describe this unique behavior in Mg matrix, a non-quadratic Substituting Eq. (7) into Eq. (5), a new expression of CPB06 yield
yield criterion proposed by Cazacu et al. [37], denoted by CPB06, is criterion can be obtained in terms of 𝜎,
̄ 𝜃 and F,
introduced. The CPB06 yield criterion reads:
( )1
( ) ( ) ( ) 3𝐹 𝑎
|𝑆 1 | − 𝑘 𝑆 1 𝑎 + |𝑆 2 | − 𝑘 𝑆 2 𝑎 + |𝑆 3 | − 𝑘 𝑆 3 𝑎 = 𝐹 𝜎̄ = (8)
| | | | | | (5) 2𝑓̂(𝜃)
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

Fig. 5. Comparison between experimental data [23] and FE simulations using the proposed CPB06-PPL plasticity model. A very good correlation is achived to pick
up the asymmetry between tension and compression.

𝑎
where 𝑓̂(𝜃) = (| cos 𝜃| − 𝑘 cos 𝜃)𝑎 + (| cos( 23 𝜋 − 𝜃)| − 𝑘cos( 32 𝜋 − 𝜃)) Table 2
𝑎 Material parameters of CPB06-PPL plasticity model for the matrix and in-
+ (| cos( 43 𝜋
− 𝜃)| − 𝑘 cos( 34 𝜋
− 𝜃)) . terface.
Fig. 4a and b show the projection of the transferred CPB06-PPL plas-
ticity model in the lode angle direction. As same as CPB06 plasticity Parameter Matrix Interface

model, the proposed plasticity model reduces into Von Mises yield cri- E 42.8 GPa 42.8 GPa
terion for a = 2, k =0. Fig. 4c compares the initial yield stress predicted 𝜌 1.738 g/cm3 1.738 g/cm3
by the transferred CPB06 yield (Eq. (8)) criterion with the experimen- 𝜈 0.3 0.3
A 409.4 MPa 774.5 MPa
tal data extracted from [23]. It is found that the CPB06 yield criterion 𝜀0 0.02 0.007
achieves a good agreement with the experiments. N 0.156 0.1486
In order to describe the different strain hardening behaviors under K 0.7152+0.1933⋅ sin(𝜋 ⋅ (𝜀̄ 𝑝𝑙 − 0.05834)∕0.06846) –
𝑝𝑙
tension and compression in Mg, the PPL model with pressure and Lode A 0.9407-1.9064/(1+𝑒(𝜀̄ −0.7988)∕0.00511 ) –
angle dependencies (showing in Eq. (9)) is combined with the CPB06
model, which yields
( ) ( )
̃ ⋅ 𝑓2 𝜃̄
𝜎̄ = 𝜎𝑦 𝜀̄ 𝑝𝑙 ⋅ 𝑓1 (𝜂) (9)
3𝐹 1 𝜂̃ on MMNCs yet, so it is rationally assumed that 𝑓1 (𝜂)
̃ = 1. Thereby, the
̄ by (
Here, we replace 𝑓2 (𝜃) )𝑎 , thus a new plasticity model con-
2𝑓̂(𝜃) plastic behavior of Mg matrix is referred as a combined model (CPB06-
sidering the asymmetry under tension and compression using Lode angle PPL). This model is implemented in Abaqus/Explicit as a user material
for Mg matrix is obtained in Eq. (10), subroutine. A one element model is built to validate the proposed model.
( )1 The comparison between experiments and FEM simulations is shown in
( ) 3𝐹 𝑎
𝑓 ≡ 𝜎̄ − 𝜎𝑦 𝜀̄ 𝑝𝑙 ⋅ 𝑓1 (𝜂)
̃ ⋅ =0 (10) Fig. 5. A summary of these parameters is listed in Table 2, which will
2𝑓̂(𝜃) be used in our Mg matrix material.
The strain hardening at baseline loading condition 𝜎 y , can be ap- In order to describe the evolution of yield locus shape, the two mate-
proximately reproduced by a swift power law (Eq. (11)), rial parameters, k and a, become variables, which evolve as equivalent
( ) ( )𝑛 plastic strain increases as shown in Fig. 4d. Post-processing test data
𝜎𝑦 𝜀̄ 𝑝𝑙 = 𝐴 𝜀0 + 𝜀̄ 𝑝𝑙 (11)
presented in Ref. [41] gives two equations listed in Table 2. Note that
Here, A and 𝜀0 are two material parameters, and n is called strain the changes of k and a is to consider the Mg matrix’s material strain
hardening coefficient. Note that the modified stress triaxiality (𝜂) ̃ is de- hardening behaviors, which include both dislocation density increase in
fined as 𝜂̃ = 𝜎𝑚 ∕𝜎𝑦 (𝜀̄ 𝑝𝑙 ) as recently proposed by Ghazali [40]. The func- tensile loadings and twinning/detwinning in compressive loadings con-
tion 𝑓1 (𝜂)
̃ is usually used to consider the effect of hydrostatic pressure on ditions. It is a very complex physical phenomenon for hexagonal closed
yield. However, we have no proofs to consider the hydrostatic pressure pack metal like Mg matrix.
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

study [23,24] shows that Mg exhibits a ductile fracture. Therefore, the

strain-based MMC model is used here, see Eq. (12)

⎧ [ √ ( ( ) )]
⎪𝐴 𝑠 3 ( 𝑎𝑥 𝑠
) ̄
𝜃𝜋
𝜀̄ 𝑓 = ⎨ 𝑐𝜃 + √ 𝑐𝜃 − 𝑐𝜃 sec −1
⎪ 𝑐2 2− 3 6
⎩
√
−1
( ))⎤⎫
𝑛
⎡ ( ) (
𝑐12 ̄ ̄
⎥⎪
1+ 𝜃𝜋 1 𝜃𝜋
⋅⎢ + 𝑐1 𝜂 + sin
⎥⎬
cos (12)
⎢ 3 6 3 6
⎣ ⎦⎪
⎭

The stress-based MMC model for the interface between the matrix
and particle reads,

⎧ [ √ ( ( ) )]
⎪ 𝑠 3 ( 𝑎𝑥 𝑠
) ̄
𝜃𝜋
𝜎̄ 𝑓 = ⎨𝑐2 𝑐𝜃 + √ 𝑐𝜃 − 𝑐𝜃 sec −1
⎪ 2− 3 6
⎩
√ −1
⎡ 1 + 𝑐2 ( ) ( ( ))⎤⎫
̄
𝜃𝜋 1 ̄
𝜃𝜋 ⎪
⋅⎢ 1
cos + 𝑐1 𝜂 + sin ⎥⎬ (13)
⎢ 3 6 3 6 ⎥⎪
⎣ ⎦⎭

The calibrated 3D fracture loci for the matrix and interface are
plotted in Fig. 6. The detail material parameters used for the MMC
model are summarized in Table 3. It is worth noting that residual
stress induced by mismatch between particles and matrix is impor-
tant in interface failure. Here, we prefer to simulate the interface fail-
ure by describing the strength of interface rather than considering the
residual stress intuitively, because actually the residual stress acts to
the strength and size of interface which we are about to discuss in
Section 3.2.

2.3. Boundary condition setting in RVE models

To predict fracture behaviors of Mg/SiC composites under different

Fig. 6. (a) Strain based MMC 3D fracture locus used in the Mg matrix. One
surface for tensile loading and the other one for compressive loading conditions;
(b) Stress based MMC 3D fracture locus used in the interface for RVE models.
loading conditions, nine representative loading conditions (uniaxial ten-
sion, uniaxial compression, plane strain tension, plane strain compres-
sion, shear, equal biaxial tension, equal biaxial compression, equal triax-
ial tension, and equal triaxial compression) are simulated by the unit cell
model. The boundary conditions applied to the unit cell model are illus-
trated in Fig. 7, and the Abaqus/Explicit element types used in the unit
cell models are also provided. It should be noted that a plane constrain
condition is applied to free edge surfaces, where constrain equations
are used. Readers can refer to [19] for more details about this bound-
ary condition. Besides, we don’t use periodic boundary conditions but
axis-symmetric boundary conditions.
3. Simulation results and correlation with test data

3.1. Model correlation

2.2. Fracture modeling methods for matrix and its interface
The second challenge of the RVE modeling to predict Mg/SiC com-
posite’ ductility is the fracture modeling methods for matrix and its inter-
face. Magnesium is basically a ductile metal, but the interface between
Mg and SiC can have co-existence of brittle fracture and ductile fracture.
This has been proven by the authors [22].
There are two versions of modified Mohr-Coulomb (MMC) fracture
model, which can be used to predict material fracture under multiaxial
loading conditions [39,22]. The MMC model used in matrix is strain-
based (for ductile fracture) while the MMC model used in the interface
is stress-based (for brittle/ductile fracture). The difference between the
two fracture models comes from the different fracture mode in the ma-
terials they describe, as shown in Fig. 2. For the matrix Mg, the previous
The FEA simulation results of Mg/SiC nanocomposites are exhib-
ited in this section, where the nine loading conditions are included.
Firstly, the finite element model was correlated with test results of three
loading conditions (uniaxial tension, uniaxial compression and shear).
Secondly, the RVE model was used to predict other six loading condi-
tions. Finally, the whole fracture locus of Mg/SiC nanocomposites was
obtained.
The unit cell FE result of uniaxial compression is shown in Fig.
8. The corresponding experimental data [22,23] and macro calcula-
tion result, with the input material properties and the plasticity and
fracture model are also presented in the same figure. It demonstrated
that the true stress-plastic strain curve was well reproduced in the
hardening area, which indicated that the unit cell model estimates
the ultimate strength in a reasonable range before softening. Note
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

Table 3
Calibrated MMC fracture models for the matrix and interface, and used in unit cell models.

Parameters Matrix (Strain-based MMC model) Interface

Compression Tension (Stress-based MMC model)

c1 -0.0850 0.427 0.78

c2 240.5 MPa 217.6 MPa 145.8 MPa
𝑐𝜃𝑠 1.213 0.973 0.9091
𝑐𝜃𝑎𝑥 1.246 for 𝜃̄ < 0 1.0 for 𝜃̄ ≥ 0 1.03 for 𝜃̄ < 0 1.0 for 𝜃̄ ≥ 0 1.17 for 𝜃̄ < 0 1.0 for 𝜃̄ ≥ 0
A & n refer to Table 2

Fig. 7. A simplied schematic diagram of nine loading conditions in RVE models. The name of each loading and ABAQUS element types used are marked on figures. The
green part means symmetric boundary, dark part means loads, and the triangle means displacement constrains. A plane constrain is applied to all free edges/surfaces.

that the softening behavior of Mg/SiC nanocomposites was not yet in-
cluded in our model, which plays a key role in fracture propagation.
The present paper is focused only on fracture initiation (or fracture
locus).
The debonding of the interface between matrix and inclusion usu-
ally causes the premature failure of metal matrix composites as shown
in Fig. 9a. Many experiments and numerical investigations demon-
strated that the initiation and coalescence of microcracks or voids led
to the damage in composites and finally resulted in fracture [42-46].
It is hereby confirmed this damage mechanism and further validated
in the unit cell model. Fig. 9b shows a representative loading condi-
tion (axisymmetric uniaxial tension), which reveals the dynamic pro-
cess of fracture in the Mg/SiC composites. As shown in Fig. 9b, with
the strain increasing, a crack initiated at the interface and it coalesced
with the others. As a result of that, an unexpected brittle fracture
occurs.
3.2. Parametric studies on composite interface properties
Besides, in order to further understand the effect of interface on
the overall mechanical properties of composites, a round of para-
metric study about the interface is presented. Plane strain tension
and plane strain compression are selected as two representative load-
ing conditions. Four different interface thicknesses (4.1nm, 6.15nm,
8.2nm, and 12.3nm) are assigned, see Fig. 10a. Without changing
other interface properties, simulation results (Fig. 10b) show that
the interface thickness has no obvious impact on the tensile strength
but the compressive strength decreases with the increasing of inter-
face thickness. This may be attributed to the brittle interface frac-
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

Fig. 8. Comparison of the experimental true stress-plastic strain curves for both the composite tests and the FEM results from the unit cell RVE model. A very good
correlation was obtained. The interface fracture initiation point for composite is also predicted and marked.

Fig. 9. (a) SEM micrograph of the Mg/SiCp composites shows the typical fracture mode of interface debonding. (b) Fracture initiation and propogation processes
shown by contour plots of von Mises stress distribution with reapect to the overall strain increasing. Interface debonding and subsequent matrix fracture is the key
failure mechasim.
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al.
Fig. 10. Effect of interface thickness on the composite strength. (a) Schematic
diagram of four different interfaces. (b) RVE simulation results showing the ef-
fects of interfacial thickness on predicted fracture stress under plane strain con-
ditions.
ture under tension. The second parameter to study is the interface
strength on the mechanical performance of the Mg/SiC composites,
as shown in Fig. 11. Nine different values of c2 are used to per-
form the parameter study (Fig. 11a). The parameter c2 directly af-
fects the stress-based MMC model’s fracture limit. This range of pa-
rameters are chosen to cover interface strengths between weaker than
Mg matrix and stronger than Mg matrix. It is found that the tensile
strength increases with the increasing interface strength, and the growth
of tensile strength is not linear. However, the compressive strength
has almost no change, which is not consistent with direct intuition
in real composites. This counterintuitive result may be attributed to
the limitation of the current single unit cell model. In summary, re-
ducing the thickness of interface and improving the strength of in-
International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831
Fig. 11. Effect of interface strength on the predicted composite strength. (a)
Model inputs of fracture loci for nine different interfaces. A zoom-in view is
included. (b) RVE calculated results based on nine different interface model
parameters showing above under plane strain condtions.
terface have positive effects on the overall mechanical properties of
composites.
3.3. Result summaries of nine loading conditions
The predicted failure of the Mg/SiC composites under nine loading
condition are summaried in Fig. 12. Counter plots of equivalent plastic
strain 𝜀̄ (SDV1 in the VUMAT material subroutine) are shown as well.
The definition of equivalent plastic strain 𝜀̄ is given as below:
𝑡
𝜀̄ = 𝜀̄ 𝑝𝑙 |0 + ∫ 𝜀̄̇ 𝑝𝑙 𝑑𝑡, (14)
0
where 𝜀̄ 𝑝𝑙 |0 is the initial ̇ 𝑝𝑙
√ equivalent plastic strain, the 𝜀̄ comes from the
𝑝𝑙 𝑝𝑙
Mises plasticity 𝜀̄̇ 𝑝𝑙 = 32 𝜺̄̇ ∶ 𝜺̄̇ .
All of them show an interface dominated fracture mechanism, which
means that the largest deformed zones are always at the interface as seen
in these images. It is worth noting that the deformation capacity of the
Mg/SiC composites under compression dominated loading condition is
better than those under tension. This is consistent with the experiments.
Meanwhile, the fracture in the Mg matrix can also be observed in the
simulations, for example Fig. 12 (a), (c), (f) and (h).
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

Fig. 12. Fracture preditions of the unit cell RVE model under nine different loading conditions, which are shown in Fig. 7. The contour plots show the equivalent
plastic strain at total fracture.

Table 4 3.4. Discussion on RVE

Material parassmeters of stress-based
MMC fracture locus of Mg/SiC nanocom-
posite from the unit cell model.
Parameter Value
∗ to directly conduct in the lab. As pointed out in Ref. [27], there are still
A 406.6 MPa
n∗ 0.1545
c1 0.8064
c2 106.24 MPa
𝑐𝜃𝑠 1.3194
𝑐𝜃𝑎𝑥 1.058 for 𝜃̄ < 0 1 for 𝜃̄ ≥ 0
The corresponding fracture initiation data points are extracted from
the RVE simulation results, then the fracture locus in term of equiv-
alent stress are calibrated using the stress-based. Both 3D fracture lo-
cus and 2D fracture locus (plane stress) are plotted in Fig. 13. The set
of calibrated MMC model parameters is listed in Table 4. The avail-
able experiments data points are also presented in Fig. 13. Good sur-
face/curve fitting of fracture stress is obtained for the Mg/SiC com-
posites. It can also be seen that the fracture limits at the compression
side are higher than that at the tension side. Moreover, the fracture
stress at the compression side is beyond the yield stress (ductile frac-
ture) while the fracture stress at the tension side is not (brittle frac-
ture). Namely, the Mg/SiC composites are more ductile under com-
pression than tension. The phenomenon of strength asymmetry in ten-
sion and compression is well captured in FE simulation by unit cell
model.
To sum up, the current unit cell model gives good simulation re-
sults as compared with the experiments and further predicts the frac-
ture behaviors under other loading conditions which are very difficult
some limitations of RVE that need more work in the future, which are
summarized as follows:
(1) In the real Mg/SiC composites, the particles are randomly
distributed in the matrix. As shown in Fig. 1, the unit
cell model is ideally assumed that the particles are ho-
mogeneously distributed in the matrix. Therefore, this unit
cell model cannot be used to study the interaction between
particles.
(2) The shape of particle is assumed to be spherical. However, the
shape of real particles is usually irregular. This may affect the
prediction of composite fracture, too.
(3) The current studies are focused on fracture initiation. The ma-
terials softening due to damage has not included yet, which is
critical to predict fracture propagation.
(4) Unit cell model’s simulation in Abaqus/Explicit is very time
consuming for studying nonlinear behaviors like plasticity
and fracture. More efforts are needed in the future for ad-
vanced RVE models, which consider distribution and morphol-
ogy of particles, interface residual stress from manufactur-
ing, and more accurate/complex composite interface debonding
models, etc.
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al. International Journal of Mechanical Sciences 184 (2020) 105831

Fig. 13. (a) Comparison among the experiments, FEM results and the calibrated fracutre locus in the 3D fracture space. (b) Same comparison at the 2D fracture
locus under plane stress condition. Experimental and predictive points are marked, respectively.

4. Conclusions
A unit cell RVE model is developed to simulate and predict the frac-
ture behavior of the Mg/SiC nanocomposite. The strength asymmetry
between tension and compression for Mg matrix is considered by in-
corporating the CPB06 plasticity model into the PPL model. The stress-
based MMC model is employed for describing the coexistence of duc-
tile and brittle fractures in Mg/SiC composites. Simulation results show
that the unit cell model achieves a good agreement with the experiments
(uniaxial tension, uniaxial compression and shear). The fracture process
simulation validates that the interface failure takes the main responsi-
bility for brittle fracture in Mg/SiC composite. Parametric studies on
composite interface demonstrate that reducing interface thickness and
improving the interface bonding strength are beneficial in the compos-
ite design. Additional predictive results from RVE models (plane strain
tension, plane strain compression, equal biaxial tension, equal biaxial
compression, equal triaxial tension, equal triaxial compression) are ob-
tained, and it gives a complete fracture locus of Mg/SiC composite. This
unit cell model is an efficient approach for investigating the fracture
behavior of metal matrix nanocomposites.
X. He, S. Song and X. Luo et al.
Declaration of Competing Interest
We declare that we do not have any conflict of interest.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation
of China (Grant No. 51802271), State Key Laboratory of Traction Power
(Grant No. 2015TPL_Z01), and Fundamental Research Fund for the Cen-
tral Universities (Grant No. 2682017CX090). S.S and Y.B acknowledge
partial financial supports from Department of Energy (DOE) (Grant #
DE-EEOO07864). X.H. acknowledges the financial support provided by
Chinese Scholar Council. The authors acknowledge Dassault Systèmes
for providing software license of ABAQUS (SIMULIA).
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