Numerical Simulation of Failure Behavior of Reinforced Concrete Shear Walls by a Micropolar Peridynamic Model

A reinforced concrete shear wall is an important building structure. Once damage occurs, it not only causes great losses to various properties but also seriously endangers people’s lives. It is difficult to achieve an accurate description of the damage process using the traditional numerical calculation method, which is based on the continuous medium theory. Its bottleneck lies in the crack-induced discontinuity, whereas the adopted numerical analysis method has the continuity requirement. The peridynamic theory can solve discontinuity problems and analyze material damage processes during crack expansion. In this paper, the quasi-static failure and impact failure of shear walls are simulated by improved micropolar peridynamics, which provides the whole process of microdefect growth, damage accumulation, crack initiation, and propagation. The peridynamic predictions are in good match with the current experiment observations, filling the gap of shear wall failure behavior in existing research.