{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,10,6]],"date-time":"2026-10-06T18:52:32Z","timestamp":1791312752164,"version":"4.3.1"},"reference-count":45,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"23","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2023,11,30]],"date-time":"2023-11-30T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1701302400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001809","name":"National Natural Science Foundation of China","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["52208331"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["52208331"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001809","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001809","name":"National Natural Science Foundation of China","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["3132023170"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["3132023170"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001809","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100012226","name":"Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["52208331"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["52208331"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100012226","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100012226","name":"Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["3132023170"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["3132023170"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100012226","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Nanomaterials"],"abstract":"<jats:p>The failure of the interfacial transition zone has been identified as the primary cause of damage and deterioration in cement-based materials. To further understand the interfacial failure mechanism, interfacial composite structures between the main hydration products of ordinary Portland cement (OPC), calcium silicate hydrate (CSH) and calcium hydroxide (Ca(OH)2), and silica (SiO2) were constructed while considering their anisotropy. Afterwards, uniaxial tensile tests were conducted using molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. Our results showed that the interfacial zones (IZs) of interfacial composite structures tended to have relatively lower densities than those of the bulk, and the anisotropy of the hydration products had almost no effect on the IZ being a low-density zone. Interfacial composite structures with different configurations exhibited diverse nanomechanical behaviors in terms of their ultimate strength, stress\u2013strain relationship and fracture evaluation. A higher strain rate contributed to a higher ultimate strength and a more prolonged decline in the residual strength. In the interfacial composite structures, both CSH and Ca(OH)2 exhibited ruptures of the Ca-O bond as the primary atomic pair during the tensile process. The plastic damage characteristics of the interfacial composite structures during the tensile process were assessed by analyzing the normalized number of broken Ca-O bonds, which also aligned with the atomic chain break characteristics evident in the per-atom stress map.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/nano13233059","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2023,11,30]],"date-time":"2023-11-30T09:39:12Z","timestamp":1701337152000},"page":"3059","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":10,"title":["Nanoscale Insights into the Mechanical Behavior of Interfacial Composite Structures between Calcium Silicate Hydrate\/Calcium Hydroxide and Silica"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"13","author":[{"given":"Jiuye","family":"Zhao","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Transportation Engineering, Dalian Maritime University, Dalian 116026, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Yuanhang","family":"Zhang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Transportation Engineering, Dalian Maritime University, Dalian 116026, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Dapeng","family":"Xue","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Transportation Engineering, Dalian Maritime University, Dalian 116026, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Chunyi","family":"Cui","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Transportation Engineering, Dalian Maritime University, Dalian 116026, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Wenzheng","family":"Li","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Civil Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, Dalian 116024, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Fang","family":"Liu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Shaanxi Key Laboratory of Safety and Durability of Concrete Structures, Xijing University, Xi\u2019an 710123, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2023,11,30]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"104118","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jobe.2022.104118","article-title":"Microstructure of Ultra-High-Performance Concrete (UHPC)\u2014A Review Study","volume":"50","author":"Bahmani","year":"2022","journal-title":"J. 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