Study of Mode I Fracture of Graphene Sheets Using Atomistic Based Finite Element Modeling and Virtual Crack Closure Technique

In this letter a finite element based atomistic model is proposed. This model was employed to study the mode I fracture characteristics of graphene monolayers. The proposed model was found to be less numerically intensive with fewer degrees of freedom in comparison to other numerical techniques, such as Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics modeling. An approach based on the virtual crack closure technique was employed to develop the atomistic formulation for estimating strain energy release rates for graphene sheets under opening mode.