Fractal Pattern Characterization of Acoustic Emissions for Continuous Damage Assessment of Reinforced Concrete Structures

Many critical reinforced concrete structures and components undergo progressive damage because of the nature and magnitude of service loads, environmental effects, deterioration of material properties, and other factors. Depending on their locations, they may also experience major additional damage from natural disaster events such as earthquakes, hurricanes, high winds, and tornadoes. Continuous damage and structural assessment of these structures provides a mean for their possible timely repair and retrofitting for continuous use and operations. Research on brittle materials indicates that the microfracturing process (acoustic emission) is fractal in nature in both the temporal and spatial domains. The associated characteristics may serve as good indicators for continuous damage assessment and catastrophic failure prediction.