Critical features revealed in acoustic and electromagnetic emissions during fracture experiments on LiF

Acoustic emissions (AE) and electromagnetic emissions (EME) are produced during the fracture of solids permitting the monitoring of fracture processes and the study of fracture dynamics. In the literature there have been reported many attempts to connect the AE originating from the fracture of materials with the notion of criticality. Although there is an extended study of the AE during the fracture of a material and its relevance with the notion of criticality, this is not the case for the EME. In order to further investigate the possible critical behavior of fracture processes through AE and EME, we proceed here to the analysis of AE and EME time series using the recently proposed method of natural time (NT). We focus on the analysis of simultaneously acquired AE and EME time series, recorded during fracture experiments on LiF (non-irradiated and irradiated) specimens. The natural time analysis indicates that criticality is reached by both fracture-induced emissions, reflecting the critical behavior of the associated fracture processes. Moreover, it is found that both non-irradiated and irradiated LiF specimens exhibit similar behavior: the AE reach criticality earlier than EME, while EME reach criticality just before the global fracture.