内容简介：
This volume contains the presentations from the IUTAM Symposium on rheology of bodies with defects. The Symposium aimed at building a bridge between macroscopic and microscopic research on damage and fracture behaviour that contributes to the failure of defective bodies made of metal, polymer, composite, and even mortar, concrete, clay and rock-mass, emphasizing the time effects involved in the process. Besides the usual continuum damage mechanics approach, the thermodynamics of non-equilibrium systems approach is also presented, as well as a survey of the study of creep life assessment, especially in relation to polymers. The book is suitable for research engineers and scientists, and graduate students in mechanical and material sciences.