Carbon dioxide makes up more than 70% to greenhouse gases; and the production of ordinary Portland cement (OPC), the key ingredient to make concrete, is one of the main causes for anthropogenic CO2 emission. Recently our team has created a novel replacement for normal concrete (NC): reactive MgO-based ductile composites. It looks like NC, nevertheless it is more sustainable in multiple ways: it replaces all the OPC with the cleaner reactive MgO as binder; it adopts minimum amount of fibers not only compensating but greatly enhancing the tensile properties; with the presence of water, this material heals the early crack in itself by absorbing ambient CO2 to form healing products.
In this proposed project, we will enhance the mechanical and self-healing properties of this prototype. We are going to study the impacts of different types of fibers, the processed fibers, curing condition and penetration depth of CO2 on the MgO-based cementitious composites. This will be three-year project, the enrolled students are welcome to continue in the future UROPs (for both summer sessions and spring/fall sessions).