High performance concrete (HPC) bridge decks are prone to premature cracking if movement is restrained. Internal curing (IC) can reduce shrinkage cracking in concrete structures, thus improving their performance and service life. However, there is very limited information available in the literature on the possible extension of service life due to internal curing. This paper addresses this ques...

Concrete is an essential building material which is widely used in construction industry all over the world due to its compressible strength. Curing of concrete plays a vital role in durability and other performance necessities. Improper curing can affect the concrete performance and durability easily. When areas like scarcity of water, structures is not accessible by humans external curing can...

In the twenty-first century, most high-performance concretes, and many other ordinary concretes, are now based on blended cements that contain silica fume, slag, and/or fly ash additions. Because the chemical shrinkage accompanying the pozzolanic and hydraulic reactions of these mineral admixtures is generally much greater than that accompanying conventional portland cement hydration, these ble...

Both the hardening process and formation of microstructure of concrete are significantly influenced by the curing condition. The capillary absorption of concrete is closely related to the structure and distribution of the pores within the material. This paper presents an experimental study on the influence of four curing conditions, i.e., standard curing, natural curing, water curing, and seale...

Rigidization of inflatable space structures via internal resistive heating requires carbon fiber reinforced material to consolidate and cure on-command. In terms of the spacecraft’s life, the rigidization process transforms a structurally weak “balloon” into a robust, stable design. Internal resistive heating provides an active approach for inducing permanent shapeholding and structural stiffen...

A novel concept in internal curing of High Performance Concrete is based on dispersing very small, saturated lightweight aggregates (LWA) in the concrete, containing sufficient water to counteract self-desiccation. With this approach, the amount of water in the LWA can be minimized, thus economizing on the amount of the LWA. In this study, the pore structure of different size fractions of pumic...

High performance concrete (HPC) requires a low water-to-cementitious materials mass ratio (w/cm), often with the inclusion of supplemental cementitious materials such as silica fume in the mixture, thus necessitating the use of a superplasticizer. Because of the low w/cm and rapid reaction at early ages, proper curing from the earliest time possible is very essential in HPC. Internal curing has...

Using industrial waste such as bottom ash (BA) is a potential alternative to using sand for tackling the current shortage of natural resources in construction industry. This, along with internal curing concept, enables proper inside and out, especially low water-to-cement (w/c) ratio concrete, which has permeability. The work investigated flow, compressive strength, heat microstructure characte...

The resulting internal stress situation in curing dental composites is still oversimplified due to analytical inaccessibility of local information of state and loading. Similar applies to the strength behavior of cured dental composites. Using recent progress of a finite-element-based curing model, we developed and attempted to benchmark dental composites based on their mechanical behavior and ...