Fast radiography during dynamic Brazilian tests on porous alumina

Space wastes represent an increasingly threatening risk for mobile structures and aerospace traffic (e.g., space modules or spacecraft), leading to potential high velocity impacts that can cause devastating damage. On the other hand, there are increasing demands to reduce the on-board weight in order to reach more effective launching by lowering the fuel consumption. Porous ceramics present a good candidate for light protective solutions thanks to the ability to dissipate impact energy through fragmentation and to tailor their microstructural porosity within a given need. Therefore, the mechanical behavior of porous ceramics under dynamic loadings needs to be assessed in order to gain better understanding of the local damage and fracture mechanisms under high strain rate loadings. The aim of this proposal is thus to identify the fracture mechanisms in porous ceramics and how they are modified by the microstructure type (size and morphology of porosities) and the strain-rate.