This project proposes an innovative and fundamentally different fatigue damage mitigation methodology based on the self-healing mechanism. Detailed mechanism modeling, numerical methods, state-of-the-art experimental techniques, and advanced material synthesis are integrated together for system development and validation. Three major tasks are proposed: 1) Investigate the self-healing mechanism using the newly developed multiscale fatigue damage simulation model for metallic materials; 2) Synthesize a new epoxy/polymer coating material with desired transient temperature and mechanical properties from mechanism modeling; 3) Perform fatigue crack growth testing of Al-7075-T6 specimens with and without self-healing for model validation.
