Fundamentals of fracture

The papers in this issue of Philosophical Magazine A are a selection from work presented at the 6th International Conference on the Fundamentals of Fracture, held at the Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester, UK, between 26th and 30th March 2001. The meeting was attended by 87 delegates; 33 oral and 60 poster presentations were given. The work presented at the meeting covered a broad range, but was focused tightly on theory, modelling and experiment (ideally all three in combination), exploring and giving insight into the basic processes of fracture. The scope was broadened from that of previous meetings in the series, to include work on fundamentals of fatigue and on fracture of engineering materials, in addition to the ‘traditional’ topics: theory of fracture processes, atomisticand dislocation-based models of fracture, and experiments on simple, model, materials. Speakers were encouraged to present work and ideas in process of development, and ideas that might be controversial; hence some papers of this type have been published in this volume despite referees disagreeing to some extent with the arguments presented by the authors. All papers generated considerable discussion, both in the lecture theatre and in the conference bar, which doubled as the poster area. While it is perhaps invidious to single out particular presentations, the natural inclination of delegates to relax and enjoy topics outside the ‘normal’ meant that papers on fracture of snow and wood and the pre-dinner lecture on the fracture