Nonlocal regularisation of a model based on breakage mechanics for granular materials

We apply a nonlocal regularisation method to a breakage model recently proposed for the constitutive modelling of crushable granular materials. Coupling between material points is taken into account through the nonlocal averaging applied to the yield function. This enables us to introduce a length scale to continuum breakage models, and therefore helps to overcome numerical difficulties arising from physical instabilities encountered when the material effectively undergoes softening due to crushing. The numerical implementation of the nonlocal version of a breakage model is briefly presented. To demonstrate its promising features, this nonlocal model is used in a series of numerical analyses of high pressure shearing processes, in which grain crushing mechanism governs the material behaviour.