Wittel, Falk, Dr.

ETH Zürich Dr. Falk Wittel Institut f. Baustoffe (IfB) HIF E 28.1 Schafmattstr. 6 8093 Zuerich Phone: +41 44 633 28 71 E-Mail:

Research:

Most of my research deals with discrete element simulations (DEM) of fracture and fragmentation of quasi brittle materials. To get an idea about what DEM is, you can check a WIKIPEDIA article on it, browse through my publications. In this field I am mainly working with Hans Herrmann, Humberto Carmona, and Ferenc Kun. Applications of DEM to failure of wood, membranes and ionic polymer gels are made together with Gerhard Dill-Langer, Dirk Ballhause and Thomas Wallmersperger.

An other important part of my work is devoted to mechanism based modelling of failure and fracture in composite materials in the framework of ABAQUS. There together with Michele D'Ottavio and Bernd Kröplin, we implement a toolbox for failure modelling inside ABAQUS. Today I work on hybrid methods that include the advantages of both methods.

Fragmentation and dynamic fracture is one of my favorite topics. Present work with Kornel Kovas on simulations for dynamic fracture propagations in disordered, heterogeneous media. Other hot topics are the morphogenesis in constrained spaces together with Norbert Stoop and Roman Vetter, modelling of wood with Stefan Hering and Miller Mendoza, and transport in fracture networks with Salomon Wettstein.

Links

Publications