UKCRIC National Centre for Infrastructure Materials - Extreme Loading Facilities

火灾、撞击和爆炸等极端载荷是民用基础设施面临的常见威胁。关键基础设施，如主要公共建筑、隧道、医院、炼油厂、石化厂、交通枢纽、发电和输电系统等，暴露在这种极端载荷条件下，可能导致这些民用基础设施系统发生灾难性故障，造成重大人员和经济损失，并可能造成社会和政治混乱。随着基础设施连通性的提高和极端事件发生可能性的增加，这些风险不断增加。极端载荷条件下材料性能的可靠数据是保证弹性关键基础设施系统设计和施工的必要条件。-高温多轴加载设施（HTMDF）：现有唯一能够进行高温测试的多轴加载设施只能在低于300℃的温度下运行，远远低于基础设施材料在火灾条件下所经历的温度。-高温，高应变率和高压测试设备（H3TF）和诊断系统，用于实际基础设施材料在火灾，冲击和爆炸复合载荷下的材料性能。使用这些新设备进行的主要研究主题是：-高温下多轴载荷下全尺寸材料的机械性能（应力-应变关系，失效表面）。-全尺寸材料在高应变率、高温和大范围应力状态（如单轴拉伸、单轴压缩、平面应力、侧压）下的力学性能。-基础设施材料力学性能的多尺度、多维、多危害表征。新设备将为数值模型的验证提供不可或缺的数据。拟议的设施将成为国家基础设施材料中心（NCIM）的一部分，旨在提高基础设施材料的全寿命性能，并开发创新材料，以减少材料使用、货币和能源（碳）成本和维护。NCIM将整合英国多个机构的先进实验室设备，用于生产、加工、暴露、成像、分析和测试整个基础设施资产范围内使用的材料。NCIM将提供跨越基础设施材料整个生命周期的尖端设施，从制造和加工，通过使用寿命性能，到使用寿命结束（包括在不同极端负载条件下的灾难性失效）。在高温、高应变率、高温和高压条件下的多轴载荷下的新材料行为现象和数据对多尺度、多危害、多维材料建模具有不可估量的价值。新设施将在更现实的极端负载条件下生成数据。新的数据将提高极端荷载条件下关键基础设施的设计和施工质量。对极端载荷条件下材料性能的进一步了解可能会导致新型先进材料的开发，可能是硅材料，从而改善关键民用基础设施的安全性和弹性。

Extreme loading such as fire, impacts, and explosions are common threats to civil infrastructure. Exposure of critical infrastructure, such as major public buildings, tunnels, hospitals, oil refineries, petrochemical plants, transport hubs, power generation and transmission systems, etc., to such extreme loading conditions can lead to disastrous failures of these civil infrastructure systems resulting in major human and economic losses and potentially social and political disruption. With increasing infrastructure connectivity and rising likelihoods of extreme events, these risks increase continuously. Reliable data of material performance under extreme loading conditions are necessary to ensure design and construction of resilient critical infrastructure systems. We propose to establish the following testing facilities to generate infrastructure material performance data that cannot be obtained using existing facilities anywhere else in the world: - High temperature multi-axial loading facility (HTMDF): the only existing multi-axial loading facility that is capable of elevated temperature testing can only operate at temperatures lower than 300C, much less than temperatures experienced by infrastructure materials under fire conditions.- High temperature, high strain-rate and high pressure testing facility (H3TF) and diagnostic system for material performance under combined fire, impact and explosion loads for realistic infrastructure materials. The main research themes to be undertaken using these new facilities are:- Mechanical properties (stress-strain relationships, failure surfaces) of full-scale materials under multi-axial loading at high temperatures. - Mechanical properties of full-scale materials under combined high strain-rate and high temperature, and a wide range of stress states (e.g. uniaxial tension, uniaxial compression, plane stress, confined pressure).- Multi-scale, multi-dimensional, multi-hazard characterization of mechanical properties of infrastructure materials. The new facilities will provide indispensable data for validation of numerical models.The proposed facilities will be part of the National Centre of Infrastructure Materials (NCIM), aimed at improving whole-life infrastructure material performance and developing innovative materials to reduce material use, monetary and energy (carbon) costs and maintenance. NCIM will incorporate advanced laboratory equipment spread across a number of UK institutions for producing, processing, exposing, imaging, analysing and testing materials used across the whole range of infrastructure assets. NCIM will offer access to cutting edge facilities spanning the entire lifetime of infrastructure materials, from manufacture and processing, through in-life performance, to the end of life (including catastrophic failure under different extreme loading conditions). The new material behaviour phenomena and data under multi-axial loading at high temperatures and under combined high strain-rate, high temperature and high pressure conditions will be invaluable to multi-scale, multi-hazard, multi-dimensional material modelling.The new facilities will generate data under more realistic extreme loading conditions. The new data will enhance the quality of the design and construction of critical infrastructure under extreme loading conditions. The enhanced understanding of material performance under extreme loading conditions could lead to the development of new and advanced materials, possibly in silico, with improved behaviour for secure and resilient critical civil infrastructures.