Strengthening effect of monolayer graphene oxide on the impact mechanical properties of concrete and the mechanism analysis based on fractal theory

Graphene oxide (GO), a new nanomaterial with excellent properties, having the prospect of improving the performance of cementitious composites. Graphene oxide reinforced concrete (GORC) was prepared and the impact tests were performed through a φ100 mm SHPB test apparatus, to investigate the effects of impact velocity and GO content on the impact mechanical properties of concrete. The effects of GO on the pore structure and microscopic morphology of concrete were analyzed by MIP and SEM tests. Furthermore, the pore structure fractal dimension and fragment fractal dimension were calculated to quantitatively relate the microscopic pore structure to the macroscopic impact mechanical properties, and the enhancement mechanism of GO was investigated from microstructure optimization and stress dispersion mechanism. The results show that GO promotes the growth and aggregation of cement hydration products, and significantly improves the quasi-static and impact mechanical properties of concrete through filling-compacting effect and anticracking-unloading effect. When the GO content is 0.06 wt %, GO shows the best improvement effect. Compared with plain concrete (PC), the quasi-static compressive strength, dynamic compressive strength, elastic modulus, DIF, peak strain, ultimate strain and impact toughness are increased by a maximum of 29.95 %, 52.27 %, 9.79 %, 75 %, 51.54 %, 59.6 % and 86.2 % respectively. GORC has an obvious strain rate effect in the impact velocity range of 5.5 m/s-9.5 m/s, and the average particle size of specimen fragments satisfies a logarithmic relationship with the impact velocity. In addition, the pore structure fractal dimension and fragment fractal dimension satisfy a positive correlation. Larger pore structure fractal dimension indicates more defects in concrete and worse mechanical properties of it.