Advanced Self healing Materials in Concrete Composites

The self healing capacity of cementitious composites employed for either new or repairing applications opens challenging perspectives for the use of construction materials intrinsically able to recover its pristine durability levels, thus their guaranteeing a longer service life of the designed applications and a performance less sensitive to environmental induced degradation. One possibility of achieving the aforementioned self healing capacity stands in the use of additives featuring a ¿crystalline¿ activity. Such cracks, if not repaired, act as hotspots from where the aggressive agents penetrate and further weaken the structure by adversely affecting the steel bar integrity. In order to approach the investigation, besides conventional concrete (with and without the aforementioned admixtures) the characterization of the self healing capacity of High strength concrete with steel fibers and combination with the natural ones was also studied, i.e. their capacity to completely reseal cracks, as a function of the material composition.