Cooperative competition between melt-phase and void during micro-spallation and recompression

Dynamic tensile (micro-spallation) fracture and subsequent recompression in a molten state is the key physical process for metallic materials undergoing multiple intense dynamic loadings. However, there still lacks in-depth analysis of the complete evolution process from damage accumulation to recompression, as well as the influence of damage history on subsequent deformation and fracture. In the present work, the mechanism of cooperative competition evolution between the melt-phase and voids has been proposed as a new perspective to investigate damage evolution. Various important physical phenomena discovered in larger-scale MD simulations of molten aluminum can be self-consistently explained according to the proposed mechanism, such as the rate-dependence of spall strength and the pressure oscillation. The recompression-after-damage and second fracture process are discussed in detail to analyze the damage history effect. Under the present framework, two theoretical models have been proposed from the perspective of void and melt-phase evolution, respectively. The proposed models agree well with the simulation results and provide a comprehensive understanding of the damage evolutionary characteristics.