DARPA Gives New Life to Old Concrete Structures Through “Vascularization”
BRACE program aims to revitalize legacy DoD infrastructure to extend its serviceability
OUTREACH@DARPA.MIL
3/17/2022
Concreteis a ubiquitous building material, and it is often cited as the most consumed commodity on Earth, second only to potable water.1 As this inherited concrete infrastructure continues to age, maintaining and repairing concrete is of increasing strategic importance to both defense and civilian infrastructure. Missile silos and naval piers, for example, are often many decades old and not easily replaced, and the DoD relies on concrete airfield pavements that are subject to damage from overuse or attack and require rapid repair to maintain high operational tempos.2 Concrete cracking and corrosive deterioration contribute most to degradation and lost serviceability of steel-reinforced structures,3 but current technology is limited to surface treatments that are short-lived and do not address the underlying causes of decay. New research suggests, however, that cross-disciplinary technologies can be used to impart aged concrete with self-healing capabilities.
To explore this possibility, DARPA is launching a new program called Bio-inspired Restoration of Aged Concrete Edifices, or BRACE. The goal of BRACE is to develop technologies that impart long-lasting, self-healing capability to concrete at depths that address cracks early, to repair them, prevent their propagation, and extend the serviceability of critical infrastructure. Inspired by thevascular systems[BLOOD?] that support continuous repair in multicellular organisms and ecosystems, BRACE will develop approaches to integrate a healing “vasculature” for prolonged damage repair and prevention…
The4.5-yearresearch effort will include two Technical Areas (TAs) focused on developing long-lasting systems for transport of healing substances throughout concrete, as well as practical tools for applying, maintaining, and predicting the long-term function and performance of these systems…
“The United States ranks13thworldwide when it comes to the overall quality of infrastructure,” 4 added Pava. “While BRACE is focused on DoD applications, our hope is that the technologies generated will have potential civilian benefits as well.”
sauce: https://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2022-03-17