Terms and Definitions on Crack-Healing and Restoration of Mechanical Properties in Bituminous Materials

Abstract

Fatigue damage is one of the main modes of deterioration of bituminous materials that leads to the failure of flexible pavements. However, it is well known that bituminous materials have some capability of recovering inflicted damage to some extent due to their viscoelastic nature. This process has been referred to as “self-healing”. Recently, research on crack-healing of bituminous materials has gained more importance and popularity due to the development of self-healing materials by materials scientists and engineers, that have been used in several applications. The Rilem Technical Committee TC 278-CHA (Crack-Healing of Asphalt Pavement Materials) was created in 2016 to tackle the challenges related to testing and evaluating the crack-healing properties of bituminous materials. However, the committee members noticed that there is no clear agreement within the scientific community about some basic terms to use when it comes to this new area of interest. Hence, this paper aims to clarify some of the concepts related to crack-healing and propose some common terms to the researchers and pavement engineers.