Mechanical influence of graphene oxide in the interface between calcium silicate hydrate and quartz: A molecular dynamics study

MZ Benzhi and PY Wang and SZ Li and ZQ Wang, CONSTRUCTION AND BUILDING MATERIALS, 325 (2022).

DOI: 10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2022.126597

The interactions of calcium silicate hydrates (C-S-H) with aggregates are at the heart of critical features of cement-based materials mechanical behavior. In this article, the molecular dynamics method was employed to simulate the uniaxial tensile behavior of the interface between C-S-H, graphene oxide (GO) and quartz. The radial distribution function, stress-strain curves and energy variation curves were analyzed with different oxygen-containing functional groups of GO and different hydroxyl surface densities of quartz. The interfacial bonding energy increased by 62.97% similar to 109.44% after inserting GO into the interface. The tensile strength increased by 32.5% similar to 41.60% when the hydroxyl surface density of quartz increased. A two-stage tensile failure process was observed due to the buckling and rotating of GO, which contributes to dissipating more energy during the whole tensile deformation. Our studies enable to provide some parameters values of cementbased composites interface systems for macro-simulation and calculating mechanical properties of other similar structures. The fundamental understanding of the nanoscale interfaces properties can help us to predict the macroscopic mechanical behavior of cement-based materials more accurately.

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