Head:

Prof. Janusz Kasperkiewicz, Ph.D., D.Sc.

phone: (48-22) 826 12 81 ext. 310
e-mail: jkasper@ippt.gov.pl

Staff:

Professors:

Andrzej M. Brandt, Ph.D., D.Sc. (retired)

Janusz Kasperkiewicz, Ph.D., D.Sc.

Associate Professors:

Michał A. Glinicki, Ph.D., D.Sc.

Senior Researchers:

Maria Marks, Ph.D.

Graduates:

Dariusz Załocha, M.Sc.

Ph.D. Students:

Dariusz Alterman, M.Sc.

Daria Jóźwiak-Niedźwiecka, M.Sc.

Agnieszka Litorowicz, M.Sc.

Marek Zieliński, M.Sc.

Technical staff:

Maciej Sobczak

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Research Activities:

In the Division of Strain Fields investigations are carried out on the mechanical behaviour of brittle cement based composites. The research is organised with a view to obtaining results which could be useful in material design and execution and maintenance of structures.

Among various research problems the following may be listed:

• fracture energy flexural toughness and strength of ordinary and high performance matrices reinforced with dispersed steel, glass, carbon or polymer fibres,
• properties of the interface between brittle matrix and fibres, including single fibres and bundles of microfibres,
• optimization of composition and internal structure of composites with cement matrices,
• durability of glass fibre reinforced composites with Portland cement matrices,
• application of cement based composites for repair of concrete outdoor structures (material design, testing, technology, etc.), also application in various industrial, transportation and other structures,
• computer image analysis of material structures and its application to material design,
• application of neural networks to material design,
• development of test methods to characterise mechanical properties of cement based materials, including microhardness identification, Acoustic Emission observations, etc.

The Division is specialized in the following consulting services:

• design and optimization of mixture proportions of special concretes,
• design of fibrous composites for various applications,
• experimental determination of mechanical properties of cement based materials (strength, deformation, toughness, moduli, etc.),
• experimental determination of the quality of fibres for reinforcement,
• structural analysis of cement based materials, (pores cracks, fibres, grains, etc.), in particular standard analysis of the air-voids spacing factor in the air entrained concrete.

Key Words:

• composites, brittle matrix, high performance concretes, fibre reinforced concretes, stereology, computer image analysis, neural network methods in materials design, fracture mechanics of concrete, optimization of materials, microhardness, analysis and evaluation of hardened concrete.

Professional engagement

The members of the group are particularly involved as in the following.

• Mr. Dariusz Alterman, M.Sc., machine learning techniques in materials design;
• Prof. Andrzej M. Brandt (President of the Civil Engineering Committee of the Polish Academy of Sciences) - optimization problems in civil engineering, concrete and other brittle matrix composites theory and applications;
• Assoc. Prof. Michał A. Glinicki - durability and microstructure of cement-based composites, fibre concrete technology and properties, environmentally-friendly new concrete materials, high performance concrete applications in high rise buildings and pavements;
• Mrs. Daria Jóźwiak-Niedźwiedzka, M.Sc., frost resistance and durability of concrete;
• Prof. Janusz Kasperkiewicz - concrete materials structure and properties, image analysis applied to concrete structure, fracture mechanics, microhardness, artificial intelligence methods applied in materials sciences;
• Mrs. Agnieszka Litorowicz, M.Sc., experimental identification of cracking of concrete materials;
• Dr. Maria Marks - fibrous materials design and optimization;
• Mr. Dariusz Załocha, M.Sc., automatic image analysis, stereology and mathematical morphology, structural testing of concrete;
• Mr. Marek Zieliński, M.Sc., microhardness and AE testing of concrete.

The PPO group is currently working on a large project for NATO Science for Peace, dedicated to possibilities of predicting properties of concrete in existing civil engineering objects, in which combined are techniques of automatic image analysis, and different level structural and mechanical observations, (Acoustic Emission, microhardness, etc.), and the modern computational solutions like Artificial Neural Networks or Machine Learning algorithms. It involves computerised image analysis applied to investigation of concrete materials, micromechanical testing and evaluation of brittle matrix composites (ordinary concrete, HPC, SFRC, SCC, etc.), and design and optimization of environmentally-friendly concrete materials. In particular studied is the strength, frost resistance and durability of concrete.