We present a detailed statistical analysis of the size and temporal occurrence of burst sequences in the creep rupture of a proposed linear viscoelastic fiber bundle model. According to the model, the burst sequences of fiber breaks display a power law asymptotic behavior analogous to that of...

Quenched disorder in local breaking thresholds within a two-dimensional lattice is studied, using dilute-crack approximations. Two different failure criteria are compared. Application of classical theory of strength, instead of fracture mechanics energy balance criterion, yields two times...

A set of 3873 cracks on exposed granite rock surfaces are analyzed in order to investigate possible fracture mechanisms. The fracture patterns are compared with the Mohr-Coulomb and the Roscoe fracture models, which can be combined into a single fracture scheme. A third model for comparison is...

Geometrical properties of fractured basalt and sandstone surfaces are studied by measuring the length distribution of shadows appearing under grazing illumination. For self-affine surfaces, the distribution is predicted to follow a power law of the shadow length with an exponent depending only...