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Self-Healing Concrete Could Make Bridges Safer

Michelle Pelletier, a master’s degree candidate at the University of Rhode Island, USA, has developed a self-healing concrete that may ...

Self-Healing Concrete Could Make Bridges Safer

Posted on 08 June 2010 by Scott

Michelle Pelletier, a master’s degree candidate at the University of Rhode Island, USA, has developed a self-healing concrete that may prove to be cost-effective, to make roads safer and to reduce pollution.

By embedding a microencapsulated sodium silicate healing agent in the concrete mix, stress cracks would rupture these capsules and release the healing agent.

Tests have shown that the healing mix developed by Michelle Pelletier recovered 26 percent of its original strength after being stressed to near breakage. Regular concrete recovered by only 10 percent.

These numbers may seem insignificant, but one can imagine that bridges and road structures would be safer, because cracks would heal better and could prevent collapses and damage that could put people’s lives in jeopardy. Only 2 percent of the healing agent was used in the test, and adding a bigger amount in the mix could further improve the strength of the concrete.

Pelletier is conducting further studies to figure out if the sodium silicate would also prevent corrosion, which would also be beneficial; usually, steel reinforcement bars are used when building concrete, and reducing the chance of them rusting will obviously make these structures more solid.

A lot of research is done in making concrete more solid, but many solutions are too costly for commercial production. Pelletier’s healing agent would be cost-effective.

Finally, producing concrete requires a lot of energy, so if it lasts longer with this healing agent, less concrete would be produced, which would reduce CO2 emissions.