Cooperative Dynamics in the Fiber Bundle Model

Abstract

We discuss the cooperative failure dynamics in the fiber bundle model where the individual elements or fibers are Hookean springs that have identical spring constants but different breaking strengths. When the bundle is stressed or strained, especially in the equal-load-sharing scheme, the load supported by the failed fiber gets shared equally by the rest of the surviving fibers. This mean-field-type statistical feature (absence of fluctuations) in the load-sharing mechanism helped major analytical developments in the study of breaking dynamics in the model and precise comparisons with simulation results. We intend to present a brief review on these developments.