Monitoring the evolution of material structure in cement pastes and concretes using electrical property measurements

Electrical conductivity is an effective parameter to monitor the microstructural features of cement-based materials. Monitoring the early age hydration process in cementitious materials containing mineral and chemical admixtures, and non-invasive determination of the pore structure features, through the use of electrical response, is discussed in this paper. The initial and final setting times of cement pastes predicted using electrical property based methods are very close to the measured values, showing that conductivity is an effective tool to monitor the setting process in plain and modified systems. The evolution of total porosity in the selected cement paste and concrete systems is predicted using electrical property based models derived from effective medium and percolation theories, and is found to match well with the experimental values.