Effects of variable electric field on crack growth of aluminum nanoplate: A molecular dynamics approach

Abstract

Studying cracks in aluminum (Al) nanosheets is crucial because it enhances our understanding of their mechanical properties and failure mechanisms, which are vital for applications in lightweight structures, electronics, and nanotechnology. In this study, different levels of an external electric field (EF) (1, 2, 3, and 5 V/Å) were used to see how they affected the growth of nanocracks in Al nanoplates. This investigation was carried out utilizing molecular dynamics simulation and LAMMPS software. Increasing EFA to 2 V/Å increased to maximum (Max) stress from 230.567 to 242.032 GPa. Furthermore, increasing the voltage to 5 V/Å reduced Max stress to 230.567 GPa. Max (Vel) occurred in the presence of 2 V/Å which reached 14.2192 Å/ps. The increase in atomic Vel in Al nanoplates can be attributed to enhanced atomic collisions and energy transfer among atoms as the EFA increases to 5 V/Å, the Vel declined to 11.9908 Å/ps. On the other hand, the outputs predicted the atomic evolution of designed Al nanoplates can manipulate the EF value changes. Numerically, by changing the EF parameter from 1 to 5 V/Å, the nano-crack length value varied from 27.87 to 30.16 Å. Physically, this structural evolution occurred through changes in interaction energy (mean attraction energy) within various regions of Al nanoplates. In industrial cases, this nano-crack length manipulation by EF amplitude parameter can be used to prepare atomic nanoplates with different resistances to the crack growth process.