MECHANICS OF QUASI-BRITTLE MATERIALS
MICAELA MERCURI
Visiting Scholar of Civil Engineering, Northwestern University
PhD Candidate of Civil Engineering, University of L'Aquila, Italy
Overview
Micaela is a second year Ph.D. candidate in Civil Engineering in the Department of Civil, Building and Environmental Engineering (DICEAA) at the University of L’Aquila (Italy). She is currently a visiting scholar at Northwestern University. Micaela obtained Bachelor and Master’s Degree of Civil, Building and Environmental Engineering from the University of L’Aquila. Prior to the PhD studies, she worked as a civil engineer in L'Aquila city, for the restoration of masonry and concrete buildings. Her current research interests lie in formulating and validating the behavior of unreinforced masonry structures, as well as in understanding the effectiveness of the reinforcement techniques to be applied to existing buildings.
Current Research
Numerical Analysis for the Prediction of the Mechanical Behavior of Masonry Buildings
The Lattice Dicrete Particle Model (LDPM) is applied to model historical masonry structures. By performing numerical analysis at the mesoscale, one can accurately predict the quasi-brittle behavior of various types of construction made out of masonry, namely regular or irregular, reinforced or unreinforced structures.
