Topologically interlocked structures are assemblies of interlocking blocks that hold together solely through contact. Such structures have been shown to exhibit high strength, energy dissipation, and crack arrest properties. Recent studies on topologically interlocked structures have shown that both the peak strength and work-to-failure saturate with increasing friction coefficient. However, this saturated structural response is only achievable with nonphysically high values of the friction coefficient. For beam-like topologically interlocked structures, non-planar blocks provide an alternate approach to reach similar structural response with friction properties of commonly used materials. It remains unknown whether non-planar blocks have similar effects for slab-like assemblies, and what the achievable structural properties are. Here, we consider slab-like topologically interlocked structures and show, using numerical simulations, that non-planar blocks with wave-like surfaces allow for saturated response capacity of the structure with a realistic friction coefficient. We further demonstrate that non-planar morphologies cause a non-linear scaling of the work-to-failure with peak strength and result in significant improvements of the work-to-failure and ultimate deflection - values that cannot be attained with planar-faced blocks. Finally, we show that the key morphology parameter responsible for the enhanced performance of non-planar blocks with wave-like surfaces is the local angle of inclination at the hinging points of the loaded block. These findings shed new light on topologically interlocked structures with non-planar blocks, allowing for a better understanding of their strengths and energy absorption.

翻译：拓扑互锁结构是由互锁块体通过接触保持在一起的结构。研究表明，此类结构具有高强度、耗能能力和止裂特性。近期关于拓扑互锁结构的研究表明，随着摩擦系数的增加，其峰值强度和破坏功均趋于饱和。然而，这种饱和的结构响应仅能在摩擦系数达到非物理高值时实现。对于梁状拓扑互锁结构，非平面块体为使用常见材料摩擦特性实现类似结构响应提供了替代方案。目前尚不清楚非平面块体对板状结构是否具有类似效果，以及可实现的结构特性如何。本文研究了板状拓扑互锁结构，并通过数值模拟证明，采用波状表面的非平面块体能够在实际摩擦系数下实现结构响应能力的饱和。我们进一步证明，非平面形态导致破坏功随峰值强度呈非线性标度变化，并显著提升破坏功和极限挠度——这些数值是平面块体无法达到的。最后，我们揭示出，非平面波状块体性能提升的关键形态参数是承载块体铰接点处的局部倾斜角。这些发现为含非平面块体的拓扑互锁结构提供了新见解，有助于深入理解其强度与能量吸收特性。