Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055

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Cold Regions Science and Technology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/coldregions

Peridynamic modeling of the micromechanical response of snow under

high strain rates
Brendan West a, *, Taylor Hodgdon b, 1, Devin O'Connor c, 1, Julie Parno a, Zoe Courville a
a
Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, Hanover, NH, USA
b
Geospatial Research Laboratory, Alexandria, VA, USA
c
Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM, USA

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Modeling the mechanical response of snow is a challenge due to the wide range of properties and conditions that
Snow mechanics impact the mechanics, such as temperature, loading conditions, and the geometry of the microstructure. Current
Micromechanical modeling modeling approaches including the finite element and discrete element methods have made great strides in
Peridynamics
modeling the micromechanical behavior of snow, but they often make simplifications to the microstructure
geometry and failure process. However, it has been shown that the geometry of individual snow grains and the
sintered bonds that form between them, as well as the failure of these bonds, are important factors in the
micromechanical behavior of snow. We investigate a modeling framework called peridynamics that has not been
applied to snow problems previously, but has been successfully applied to material fracture problems. This
approach can use segmented voxels from μCT scans of snow as the model input geometry, which allows for
highly accurate representations of realistic snow microstructures within the model. We provide the first analyses
to determine appropriate simulation domain sizes and the domain resolutions required to capture realistic snow
behavior with peridynamics. We show that the approach is able to simulate realistic brittle behavior for snow at
very high strain rates (≥ 0.1s− 1 ). The model naturally produces highly damaged regions within the sintered bond
regions of the microstructure without any preconditioning. We then discuss next steps for further validating
peridynamics for snow applications.

1. Introduction how the macroscopic mechanical response of snow transitions between

Understanding the mechanical response of snow is important for a
multitude of applications, including forecasts of avalanche initiation,
mobility in high latitude regions, and winter sports performance
(Kabore et al., 2021). It is well-established that there is a strong rela­
tionship between snow's mechanical response and its microstructure.
Although these relationships have not been explicitly characterized, it
has been shown that the mechanical response is affected by the network
of sintered bonds that form between grains, the shape of individual snow
grains, and the non-bonded contacts between grains [Keeler and Weeks,
1968; Narita, 1980; Kirchner et al., 2001; Hagenmuller et al., 2014a;
Hagenmuller et al., 2015; Mede et al., 2018; Mulak and Gaume, 2019;
Willibald, 2021]. In addition, these microstructural characteristics affect
different deformation regimes.
Hagenmuller et al. [2015] classifies the deformation of sintered snow
in compression into multiple regimes, with the first corresponding to an
elastic response for small strains. This initial elastic regime does not
exhibit bond failures, as all of the deformation is stored as elastic energy
in the bonds [Hagenmuller et al., 2015]. As compression advances,
stresses concentrate in these thin bond regions until they eventually fail
[Kirchner et al., 2001; Hagenmuller et al., 2014b]. Next the snow enters
a frictional, or granular, regime where more and more bonds break, and
individual ice grains start to rearrange as they contact and slide past
each other [Hagenmuller et al., 2015]. The onset of failure in snow, and
therefore the transition from elastic to granular regimes, is highly
dependent on strain rate. Snow undergoes viscous-plastic deformation

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: brendan.a.west@erdc.dren.mil (B. West).
1
Began work on this project while an employee at the Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2023.104055
Received 3 February 2023; Received in revised form 11 September 2023; Accepted 28 October 2023
Available online 2 November 2023
0165-232X/Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
B. West et al.
under small strain rates, and undergoes brittle deformation for high
strain rates [Kinosita, 1967, Chandel et al., 2014, Kabore and Peters,
2020]. The transition between the two regimes is generally reported
between 1 × 10− 4 to 1 × 10− 3 s− 1 [Kabore and Peters, 2020], but is
reported to depend on a number of different factors [Fukue, 1977].
Brittle failure of snow is characterized by concentrated regions of
material damage (reference Fig. 7.4 in Fukue, 1977), where many bonds
fail and combine to create fractured surfaces through the microstructure
[Fukue, 1977]. Peak stresses are typically reached within 1% strain
[Kinosita, 1967; Fukue, 1977]. In unconfined compression, stress within
the sample can decrease abruptly as clusters of still-bonded grains fall
out of the microstructure [Kinosita, 1967; Willibald et al., 2019; Wil­
libald, 2021]. Brittle failure of the “first kind” occurs at lower strain
rates within the brittle regime, where the stress-strain response can
exhibit a “saw-tooth” shape as the stress periodically drops due to snow
crumbling out of the sample, before rebounding as the remaining snow
microstructure begins to support the compressive load again [Yosida
et al., 1958; Kinosita, 1967; Fukue, 1977; de Montmollin, 1982; Kabore
and Peters, 2020]. Brittle failure of the “second kind” occurs at higher
strain rates, where snow reportedly exhibits only one stress peak fol­
lowed by a lower residual stress [de Montmollin, 1982; Salm, 1982]. In
addition, de Montmollin [1982] describes that compressive strength is a
function of fast metamorphism, which is the process of sintered bonds
growing and new bonds forming. However, as compression rates in­
crease, the influence of fast metamorphism decreases, as there is less
time for bonds to strengthen or form as the microstructure deforms. For
very high compression rates, the influence of fast metamorphism is
negligible, and therefore the compressive strength remains essentially
constant as compression strain rates increase further [Kinosita, 1967; de
Montmollin, 1982]. We are particularly interested in modeling the
snow's response to compression under high strain rates (≥ 0.1 s− 1 ) as
this is the dominant failure mechanism for vehicle mobility applications.
Developing accurate and generalized models of snow is a challenging
task, as the mechanical response depends on a number of factors
including temperature, moisture content, density, and loading condi­
tions [Hagenmuller et al., 2015; Mulak and Gaume, 2019]. Great
progress has been made in recent years applying the finite element
method (FEM) [Köchle and Schneebeli, 2014; Hagenmuller et al.,
2014b; Chandel et al., 2014; Chandel et al., 2015; Gerling et al., 2017]
and the discrete element method (DEM) [Hagenmuller et al., 2015;
Gaume et al., 2015; Mede et al., 2018; Mulak and Gaume, 2019;
Bobillier et al., 2020; Willibald et al., 2019; Willibald, 2021] to
modeling snow mechanics. FEM is a popular numerical modeling
approach that treats the simulated material as a continuous body, and
often uses constitutive models to capture the material's response to
different loading conditions. The DEM is a particle method, which
means it treats the material as a collection of rigid bodies that interact
with each other in a granular manner as the material deforms. These
modeling approaches have allowed researchers to study fine-scale de­
tails of how the snow microstructure responds to different loading
conditions. However, each have considerable shortcomings, as further
detailed in (Section 2).
In this study, we investigate the utility of an alternative modeling
methodology, known as peridynamics, to further improve investigations
and understanding of the micromechanical response of snow. Peridy­
namics has been used extensively to model fracture of different brittle
materials, as it is able to model deforming materials with many dis­
continuities due to it's integro-differential formulation. It is able to
simulate continuous materials that fracture into multiple components,
and some peridynamic implementations can then model the interaction
between the fractured pieces. We feel it is a promising approach for
modeling the brittle behavior of snow. However, there are certain pre­
liminary analyses that must be conducted before applying the approach
to snow simulations with confidence.
In this paper, we begin by reviewing the current state of the art for
numerical models of snow (Section 2), and then present the governing
2
Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055
equations of peridynamics (Section 3.1) and the specific modeling li­
brary we use (Section 3.2). Next, we describe how we generate our
numerical domains (Section 4) and present analyses to establish an
appropriate resolution of the points comprising the model geometry
(Section 5.1) and a sufficient representative volume element (RVE) size
(Section 5.2). With these key modeling attributes determined, we then
present preliminary results from compression simulations (Section 5.3)
and show that peridynamics is able to replicate several aspects of snow's
brittle failure under high strain rates. In addition, we investigate a model
parameter related to the failure process and how it may be tuned to
match experimental results in the literature. These analyses provide a
guide for future applications of peridynamics to micromechanical
models of snow, and we discuss various next steps for further validating
the approach for snow simulations (Section 6).
2. Snow modeling background
Due to snow's multifaceted behavior at different loading conditions,
several researchers have been inspired to use different modeling ap­
proaches that highlight either the continuous behavior or the granular
behavior of the material. FEM has been a popular approach in modeling
snow deformation [Köchle and Schneebeli, 2014; Hagenmuller et al.,
2014b; Chandel et al., 2014, 2015], as it is a widely-used methodology
that allows the use of realistic material properties and well-developed
constitutive models. Köchle and Schneebeli [2014] and Gerling et al.
[2017] both used FEM models to estimate the elastic properties of
varying snow sample sizes initialized from μCT data. However, they did
not model material failure. Classical FEM is designed for continuum
materials, and therefore discontinuities in the material, such as the
fracture of sintered bonds, can present challenges. Often times, addi­
tional methodologies are necessary to overcome this limitation. For
example, Hagenmuller et al. [2014b] accounted for failure in their FEM
model with a pre-computed map of potential crack paths within the
microstructure that were identified via a watershed segmentation
approach [Theile and Schneebeli, 2011]. If a failure criterion was
reached between two grains, then they were instantaneously discon­
nected following the pre-computed crack path, and the model would
restart using the newly fractured microstructure geometry. Chandel
et al. [2014] developed an alternative FEM implementation that did not
require re-meshing and instead used an elasto-plastic constitutive law
that developed a damage parameter throughout the simulations. This
damage scalar evolved as a function of plastic strain, and was used to
reduce the material's elastic modulus wherever damage was present
(Eqs. 3 and 4 in Chandel et al., 2014). This approach was shown to
capture realistic strain softening behavior in Chandel et al. [2014], as
well as realistic stress-strain behavior and failure envelopes of different
snow types in Chandel et al. [2015]. However, it is not clear in either the
Hagenmuller et al. [2014b] or Chandel et al. [2014] FEM approaches
how the non-bonded portions of the mesh interacted if they came in
contact. As highlighted in the deformation regimes described by
Hagenmuller et al. [2015] and Bobillier et al. [2020], snow begins to
behave like a granular material once sintered bonds have failed, and
therefore the contact between ice grains becomes increasingly important
to capturing the mechanical behavior of snow.
An alternative modeling framework for snow is the DEM, which is
well-suited for simulating granular materials. Several researchers have
applied the DEM to snow mechanics problems ranging from models of
individual snow grain interactions [Hagenmuller et al., 2015; Mede
et al., 2018; Willibald et al., 2019; Willibald, 2021] to models of
avalanche initiation [Gaume et al., 2015; Mulak and Gaume, 2019;
Bobillier et al., 2020]. A common DEM approach is to model the sintered
bonds between grains with cohesive contact laws that have a prescribed
failure criteria. This facilitates simulations of the snow's elastic behavior
before bond failure, as well as the granular material behavior post-
failure. However, DEM simulations with thousands or millions of par­
ticles can be computationally expensive, and therefore many
B. West et al.
applications have made simplifying assumptions in order to reduce the
computational overhead. Several DEM snow models to date have used
spherical or circular particles because these shapes have simple and
efficient contact mechanics [Gaume et al., 2015, Willibald et al., 2019,
Bobillier et al., 2020, Kabore and Peters, 2020a,b, Kabore et al., 2021,
Peters et al., 2021]. A couple studies used a more complex sphere-
clumping approach to represent snow grain shapes segmented from
μCT scans of snow samples [Hagenmuller et al., 2015; Mede et al.,
2018]. This method approximates each grain shape with a collection of
rigidly connected sphere particles. In addition, many of the avalanche
studies reduced computational cost by using two-dimensional models,
or making their particles larger than the actual size of snow grains in
order to increase the scale of their simulation domains [Gaume et al.,
2015, Mulak and Gaume, 2019, Bobillier et al., 2020]. Simplifying as­
sumptions are also made for the cohesive inter-particle bond models,
which often approximate a rectangular or cylindrical structure for the
bonds [Gaume et al., 2015, Bobillier et al., 2020, Kabore and Peters,
2020a,b, Kabore et al., 2021, Peters et al., 2021]. Although these ap­
proximations improve computational efficiency, they often over-
simplify the complex geometry of real ice grains and sintered bonds.
In this paper we investigate a third modeling framework called
peridynamics and evaluate its ability to represent key geometric and
physical aspects of the snow's microstructure that are difficult to capture
in current FEM and DEM models. The geometry of a peridynamic model
consists of many parcels, or “material points”, that make up the structure
of whatever material is being simulated. For snow, we take segmented
ice and air μCT voxels of a real sample and use the ice voxels as direct
inputs for the material points. This makes use of the exact structure of
the snow samples, and avoids simplifying the grains and bonds as simple
shapes, or through a meshing process. This also avoids the need to make
a distinction between the bond and grain portions of the microstructure,
as is done with particles and bonds in the DEM. As a result, this avoids a
common challenge with DEM models, where the geometric properties of
the particle bonds, such as their thickness and connection points to the
grain surfaces, can greatly affect the simulated mechanics. In addition,
cohesively bonded DEM simulations of snow are designed to specifically
fail at bond locations, which subsequently disappear from the simulation
once failure occurs. In FEM models that explicitly model fracture, the
fracture paths are often pre-computed and the subsequent re-meshing
procedure can result in gaps in the microstructure. However, in the
peridynamics formulation, damaged regions of the microstructure are
allowed to form naturally at stress concentrations, instead of at pre­
determined locations. In addition, the damaged material points do not
disappear from the simulation, and can subsequently affect the inter­
action between grains as the snow sample compresses further. For these
reasons, we feel peridynamics is an effective approach for capturing the
second kind brittle behavior expected for our target strain rate
applications.
3. Peridynamics
3.1. Governing equations & background
Peridynamics is a fairly new methodology, having been introduced
in Silling [2000], however it has been applied to a wide range of ma­
terial modeling problems. The novel aspect of peridynamics is its
reformulation of the balance of linear momentum (Eq. 1), which typi­
cally assumes the body in motion is a continuum [Javili et al., 2019]:
ρü = ∇⋅σ + b (1)
Where ρ is the material density, ü is acceleration, and b is the body
force [Javili et al., 2019]. However, the stress divergence in this formula
(∇⋅σ) is undefined across discontinuities, such as when cracks are pre­
sent in the material. Instead, peridynamics discretizes the material
domain into a collection of material points (x) and replaces the stress
divergence term with an integral equation (Eq. 2) that sums force
3
Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055
densities (force per volume) between nearby material points [Silling,
2000; Silling et al., 2007; Javili et al., 2019]:
∫
∇⋅σ = f(u(x' , t) − u(x , t),x' − x)dV x′ (2)
Hx
Where Hx is the collection of points within a spherical region around
a central point (x), which is sometimes referred to as the point's
“neighborhood” [Silling et al., 2007]. The size of this sphere region is
defined by its radius, which is known as the peridynamic horizon, δh . A
peridynamic bond between point x and a neighboring point x' within its
horizon is denoted with 〈x' − x〉. The integral approach in Eq. 2 is what
allows peridynamics to account for discontinuities in the material, as it
can simply ignore the force densities between points that are not
bonded, for example when points span a crack.
An example of a peridynamic neighborhood undergoing deformation
is shown in Fig. 1. This figure is 2D for visualization sake, but the same
principles extend to 3D, as is the case for our model domains. An
example of a peridynamic bond is indicated with the white line con­
necting point x to a neighboring point in the figure. We feel that is
important to clarify that these peridynamic bonds are not related to the
sintered bonds that are found in the snow microstructure. Although they
both use the “bond” terminology, sintered bonds are geometric com­
ponents of the snow microstructure, whereas peridynamic bonds are
numerical entities that conceptualize when two neighboring material
points within the model are connected and apply forces on each other.
We use a state-based implementation of peridynamics, which means
the non-local force densities (f term in Eq. 2) on each material point is a
function of all its neighboring points in Hx [Silling et al., 2007]. This
force term is therefore referred to as a “force state”, and is often denoted
with T(x' , t)〈⋅〉 [Javili et al., 2019]. As the body deforms, the force state
subsequently changes. Plugging Eq. 2 into Eq. 1, and reformulating for
state-based peridynamics, the equation of motion for a material point is
[Javili et al., 2019; Littlewood et al., 2023]:
∫
ρ(x)ü(x, t) = (T(x, t)〈x' − x〉 − T(x' , t)〈x − x' 〉 )dV x′ + b(x, t) (3)
Hx
Eq. 3 is often solved with a mesh-free formulation that converts the
integral into a sum of the material points within the horizon. For a
detailed description of state-based peridynamics, we direct the reader to
Silling et al. [2007], Javili et al. [2019], and Littlewood et al. [2023].
Peridynamics facilitates material damage by severing the bonds be­
tween material points if a failure criteria is reached. A common
approach for modeling brittle failure is to break a bond once its strain
exceeds a critical stretch value, sc [Madenci and Oterkus, 2014; Javili
et al., 2019]. If the bond is severed, it no longer computes any force
densities between those material points. The value of sc for brittle ma­
terial failure is often calculated based on Griffith theory and is related to
the material's energy release rate, G0C [Silling and Askari, 2005;
Madenci and Oterkus, 2014]. We calculate G0C following Dempsey
[1991]:
G0C =
KI2
(4)
E
Where KI is the Mode I fracture toughness of ice (we base this on
values for randomly oriented freshwater in Table 2 of Dempsey, 1991),
and E is the elastic modulus of ice. We calculate sc following Eq. 6.19 in
Madenci and Oterkus [2014] for three-dimensions:
√̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
√ G0C
√
s c = √[ ( )4 ( )] (5)
√
√ 3S + 3 B 5S
δ
4
− 3 h
Where S is the prescribed shear modulus and B is the prescribed bulk
modulus.
B. West et al. Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055

(a) (b)
Fig. 1. Example diagram of a block discretized into material points (a) that undergoes a deformation (b). The neighborhood Hx around point x is indicated with the
circular regions defined by the horizon δh . Note how the neighborhood deforms with the material in the right image. The white line is an example of a peridynamic
bond formed between point x and the point underlying the white dot. Peridynamic bonds exist between point x and all other points within its neighborhood.

3.2. Peridigm implementation value for all bonds in the model. Peridigm does not allow bonds to form
during a simulation, and therefore we ignore fast metamorphism during
We use an open-source peridynamics library called Peridigm that our simulations. However, future studies may develop this functionality
was developed at Sandia National Laboratories for massively-parallel to facilitate sintering once regions of the snow come back into contact.
simulations [Parks et al., 2012; Littlewood et al., 2023]. The library Peridigm outputs material damage as a scalar value ranging from 0 to 1,
contains a wide range of functionality for different material types, indicating the percentage of broken peridynamic bonds for each mate­
damage models, numerical solvers, boundary conditions, and more. In rial point. The values for the different parameter inputs to Eqs. 4 and 5
this section we describe which of these methods we used for our simu­ are in Table 1.
lations, as well as our methods for computing different input parame­ In order to model interactions between two non-bonded pieces of the
ters. The remaining material and modeling parameters are presented in snow microstructure, we use the “Short Range Force” contact model,
Table 1. Additional information regarding the specific Peridigm version which computes a repulsive force between the points that is propor­
we used is provided in the Data Availability section. tional to a prescribed spring constant, k, [Parks et al., 2012]. We
As stated previously, we are particularly interested in high strain rate compute k based on the material's elastic modulus and the spacing be­
applications where snow behaves in an elastic manner, as opposed to tween material points, δp :
lower strain rates where the time-dependent viscoplastic behavior of
EAb,c
snow is more prominant [Gerling et al., 2017]. Therefore, we use Peri­ k= (6)
Lb
digm's Linear Peridynamic Solid (LPS) model, which is used for linear
elastic isotropic materials whose properties depend on a given density, Where Ab,c is the cross-section of the bond between points (assumed
bulk modulus, and shear modulus [Parks et al., 2012]. We define the size as a circular cross-section with a radius equal 0.5δp ), and Lb is the length
of the neighborhood in terms of the peridynamic horizon, δh , as three of the shortest bonds (equivalent to δp ). The model considers two ma­
times the material point spacing, δp . A horizon of 3δp is widely used in terial points “in contact” when the points are closer than the “Search
the peridynamics literature, and convergence studies have found that Radius” user-input, and computes the repulsive force as a function of the
this value provides peak accuracy, in particular for fracture simulations “Contact Radius” input [Parks et al., 2012]. We compute the values of
of micro-brittle materials [Rädel et al., 2017; Javili et al., 2019]. In both the “Search Radius” and “Contact Radius” as 0.9δp . The “Short
addition, we use the default influence function in Peridigm, which Range Force” contact model also computes a frictional force propor­
weighs the contributions of all bonds within the horizon equally [Parks tional to a friction coefficient, μf . The exact values of these parameters
et al., 2012]. We incorporate the ability for fracture and material are in Table 1. Currently, the “Short Range Force” contact model in
damage into the model through Peridigm's “Critical Stretch” Damage Peridigm only functions with the explicit velocity-verlet time integra­
Model. This model compares the strain in each bond to a critical stretch tion scheme. We allow Peridigm to compute the critical time step based
value, sc , following the description in Section 3.1. We use the same sc on the input material parameters.
The numerical domains are cylindrical specimens with disk-shaped
Table 1 platens on the top and bottom surfaces of the sample, which are used
Material and numerical parameters used in our initial Peridigm implementation. to apply the compression boundary conditions. An example of these
For further information on how these parameters are used, please reference domains are in Fig. 2. These platens are included as separate node sets
Parks et al. [2012] and Littlewood et al. [2023]. within the simulation, but are bonded to the neighboring snow material
Parameter Value Units points the exact same way that neighboring snow points are bonded to
Material Point Density 917.0 3 each other. The bottom platen is held stationary, while the top platen is
kg/m
Poisson's Ratio 0.3
given a “Prescribed Displacement” boundary condition acting in the
Elastic Modulus 1.0 × 109 Pa negative z-direction, which means the top platen moves downward at a
Bulk Modulus 8.333 × 108 Pa constant speed throughout the entire simulation. The speed of the top
Shear Modulus 3.846 × 108 Pa
√̅̅̅̅
platen is computed based on the specimen's initial height in order to
Fracture Toughness 1.0 × 105 Pa m prescribe a specific strain rate. We also use these platen node sets to sum
Horizon 1.200 × 10− 4 m
the “Reaction Force” on those material points so that we can measure the
Critical Stretch 8.283 × 10− 3
Search Radius m
stress on each platen. We compare our simulation results to unconfined
3.600 × 10− 5
Contact Radius 3.600 × 10− 5 m compression experiments, and therefore do not prescribe any lateral
Spring Constant 3.142 × 104 N/m boundary conditions. In addition to these boundary conditions, the snow
Friction Coefficient 0.05 material points also experience a constant gravitational body load ori­
Gravity − 9.81 m/s2 ented in the negative z-direction (direction of compression). This gravity

4
B. West et al.
( a)
Fig. 2. Diagram showing the process of taking μCT images (a) and converting a region of them into a numerical domain (b), and then compressing the sample (c).
The snow material points are gray, the top platen points are blue, and the bottom platen points are red. Note in image b that the cylinder height is twice its diameter,
and note in image c the arrow indicating the direction of compression. Due to the unconfined nature of the simulations, image c shows different pieces of still-bonded
snow grains crumbling out of the microstructure. (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of
this article.)
load is applied as a “Body Force”, which is in units of a force density.
Therefore, the gravitational body force is prescribed with a constant
value computed as:
Fg mmp ⋅g
= = ρmp ⋅g
vmp vmp
Where Fg is the gravitational force, vmp is the volume of an individual
material point, mmp is the mass of a material point, ρmp is the density of a
material point as defined in Table 1, and g is gravitational constant as
defined in Table 1.
4. Snow sample datasets
We created a number of physical snow samples that were imaged in a
μCT scanner to produce a set of images from which we created our model
geometries. Creating the geometries from real-world snow samples
allowed us to improve the geometric accuracy of our simulated snow
microstructures. Samples were created from naturally rounded snow
that was stored in a cold room at − 16 ∘ F (− 26.7 ∘ C). The snow samples
were sieved to limit the grain sizes to 450–825 μm, and packed into
Teflon cylindrical molds that were 15.5 cm tall and had diameters of 5
cm. These packed samples were then left to rest for three days at 15 ∘ F
(− 9.4 ∘ C) to ensure the samples retained their molded shapes. The snow
samples were then removed from the molds and left to rest for up to 80
days at 15 ∘ F (− 9.4 ∘ C) to continue the sintering process.
The snow samples were then imaged using a Bruker Skyscan 1173
μCT scanner. To fit the snow samples into the μCT scanner, a small cy­
lindrical container with a height of 5 cm and diameter of 2 cm was used
to extract a subsample of the snow. These subsamples were placed in the
μCT scanner and then rotated 180∘ in 0.3 to 0.4∘ steps, with 5-frame
averaged images calculated at each step. A collection of 1120 × 1120
images with 20 μm pixel resolution were recorded, which were stacked
together to make a full three-dimensional voxelized reconstruction of
the subsample microstructure. The resultant gray scale images were read
into Python and binarized using the scikit-image library [van der Walt
et al., 2014], where air voxels were assigned a value of 0 and snow
voxels were assigned a value of 1. Snow sample densities were calcu­
lated from the binarized images by dividing the mass of the snow by the
total sample volume. The mass of the snow was calculated by multi­
plying the total volume of all snow-labeled voxels by the density of ice
Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055
( b) ( c)
3
(917 kg/m ). The volume was calculated as the total volume of all voxels
(both ice and air) in the segmented image set. The (x, y, z) coordinates
and volume of each voxel were then saved to a file format that Peridigm
can ingest as input. Fig. 2 provides an overview of this workflow going
(7) from μCT images to an unconfined compression simulation.
5. Model results
5.1. Material point resolution
Earlier we introduced the concept that state-based peridynamics is a
non-local approach that accounts for material points within a small
neighborhood when integrating the material state (Eq. 3). A finer dis­
cretization of the domain results in more material points, which subse­
quently increases the number of computations, and could increase the
number of points within the neighborhood. Therefore, the spacing be­
tween material points is an important aspect of both the accuracy and
computational expense of the model. Although we can use the binarized
μCT voxels as material points directly, we may be able to reduce the
number of points while still capturing accurate material properties.
Here, we explore how coarsening the material point resolutions affects
important properties of the snow microstructure. Density and specific
surface area (SSA) are important microstructural properties often used
to quantify snow microstructure [Köchle and Schneebeli, 2014;
Hagenmuller et al., 2014a; Willibald, 2021], and therefore we must
confirm that these properties do not change as we coarsen the material
point resolution. A similar approach was used in Köchle and Schneebeli
[2014] for reducing the resolution of the FEM mesh used in their snow
model.
To create larger material points, we coarsen the μCT image voxels to
a desired resolution and then binarize that data following the procedure
in Section 4. As a result, concave regions and small surface features are
smoothed out during this coarsening procedure. To compute SSA, we use
PyVista (Sullivan and Kaszynski) to create 3D Delauney triangulations of
the snow voxels and then compute the area of the surface mesh. The
surface mesh is only used for computing SSA, and is not used in our
simulation framework. Due to the expected loss of concavities and extra
smoothing introduced in the meshing step, we expect some decrease in
the SSA values as we coarsen the μCT data. Fig. 3 shows the trend of the
parameters as the material point resolution increases from the native
5
B. West et al.
Fig. 3. Trends in snow microstructure properties as the material point size increases. Image a shows the trend in density, and image b shows the trend in SSA.
resolution, i.e. the resolution of the μCT voxels (20 μm). The y-axis
shows the difference (Δ) of each measurement from the density and SSA
values at the native resolution. “Scaling Factor” indicates how many
times larger the coarsened voxel resolution is than the original image
voxel resolution, e.g. a factor of 2 means the coarsened voxels are double
the size of the original voxels. We compute values for three different
regions in our μCT sample in order to account for variability in the
microstructure.
Fig. 3a indicates that the sample density is fairly consistent below a
scaling factor of 3, but above this point it diverges significantly from the
previous trend. Fig. 3b shows that SSA decreases steadily, but diverges
rapidly above a scaling factor of approximately 4. As mentioned previ­
ously, the meshing step used to compute SSA introduces smoothing.
However, the meshed results are only used to calculate SSA, and are not
used to initialize our peridynamic model. Therefore, the reduction in the
SSA values in Fig. 3b are larger than the reduction in our actual peri­
dynamic geometries. For context, the reduction in SSA for a scaling
factor of 2 is less than 20% of the SSA at the native resolution. Consid­
ering these trends, we decide to not exceed a coarsen factor of 2.
Therefore, we use a material point resolution of 40 μm for our simula­
tions. This coarsening reduced the number of material points in the
domain by an average factor of 8.2 times.
5.2. Representative volume element size
In this section we determine an appropriate RVE size for our peri­
dynamic model, which represents the smallest volume for our simula­
tion domain that still captures the macroscopic behavior of snow. The
RVE size is determined by choosing a variable of interest and then
running a series of simulations with increasing volume size until that
variable converges. It has been shown that the RVE size for snow models
depends on the quantity of interest being investigated as well as the
snow type [Köchle and Schneebeli, 2014; Hagenmuller et al., 2014a;
Chandel et al., 2014]. Hagenmuller et al. [2014a] notes that “local”
snow variables such as density or SSA may be captured with RVEs
containing only a few snow grains, whereas mechanical properties
require RVEs with at least a collection of bonded grains. Subsequently,
the volume needed to capture a collection of snow grains depends on the
grain size of the snow type.
The snow modeling literature contains a variety of quantities of in­
terest and snow types, and therefore reports a wide variation in RVE
sizes, with the majority of values coming from the FEM literature.
Köchle and Schneebeli [2014] used an FEM model to simulate the elastic
response of rounded grain (RG), faceted (FC), and depth hoar (DH) snow
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Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055
samples, and ultimately used RVE sizes of at least 343.0 mm3 for all
snow types. Chandel et al. [2014] created FEM models of RG snow and
computed an RVE size of 5.75 mm3 , whereas Chandel et al. [2015]
computed RVE sizes ranging between 72.83 mm3 to 105.15 mm3 for FC
snow samples. Srivastava et al. [2010] found that an RVE size of
3.65 mm3 was sufficient for capturing the thermal and elastic behavior
of snow samples, but they ultimately used samples with a size of
16.97 mm3 . Hagenmuller [2011] simulated FEM models of RG and DH
snow types, and found RVE volumes of 20.0 mm3 and 40.0 mm3 ,
respectively, were appropriate for snow strength applications. Hagen­
muller et al. [2014a] investigated the minimum cut surface for different
samples, and converged on RVE sizes ranging between 27.0 mm3 to
216.0 mm3 . In subsequent work, Hagenmuller et al. [2015] created
DEM models of RG, FC, and DH snow types (among others), and found
RVE sizes of at least 64.0 mm3 were sufficient.
We are interested in capturing snow's initial elastic behavior and
compressive strength with our peridynamics model. Therefore, our
quantities of interest are the measured elastic modulus (E) and peak
stress (σp ). Similar to the material point resolution section (Section 5.1),
we also measure the density and SSA of each RVE to ensure these
microstructure attributes do not change either. We analyze these
quantities for three different regions of our μCT scan to account for
variations in the microstructure across the snow sample. The RVEs for
each μCT region are created as concentric cylinders centered around
three different points in the microstructure. Fig. 2b illustrates an
example RVE simulation setup.
We evaluate if these quantities are converging for each μCT region by
computing ratios of the largest RVE measurement for that specific region
(Eq. 8), following the methodology presented in Hagenmuller [2011].
We multiply this ratio by 100 to reflect convergence as a percentage:
x(v)
x* = 100 × (8)
x(vmax )
Where x represents the different quantities of interest (ρ, SSA, σ p , and
E), v is each RVE volume, and vmax is the largest RVE volume [Hagen­
muller, 2011]. This calculation indicates that a quantity is converging
for that μCT region if multiple values are near 100%, with perfect
convergence corresponding to multiple values at exactly 100%. We also
test if the quantities across the three different μCT regions are
converging, which would suggest the RVE is large enough that it cap­
tures microstructural variations across the sample. We follow the
methodologies outlined in Köchle and Schneebeli [2014], Chandel et al.
[2014] and Chandel et al. [2015], who evaluated the coefficient of
B. West et al.
variation (CoV) of each quantity for their RVEs:
σq,v
CoV = 100 × (9)
μq,v
Where σ is the standard deviation, μ is the mean, and q represents the
set of different quantities of interest (ρ, SSA, σp , and E) for a given RVE
volume, v. Smaller CoV values mean the three different regions are
producing similar results. Chandel et al. [2015] chose their RVE size
once the modeled strength had a CoV less than 40%. Although it is not
explicit how Köchle and Schneebeli [2014] computed the variation in
their parameters, they chose an RVE size once E varied by less than
±20%.
Fig. 4 shows the convergence of ρ, SSA, σp , and E for different RVE
sizes across three different regions of our μCT sample. The ratio values
computed for each quantity (Eq. 8) are represented as solid lines with
different markers for each μCT region, and the CoV values (Eq. 9) are
represented as dashed lines. The gray bounding regions show 100 ±
20% for reference. Fig. 4a and 4b show that ρ and SSA converge for fairly
small RVE sizes (< 10 mm3 ), supporting the observations of Hagen­
muller et al. [2014a] that smaller RVEs are sufficient for local variables.
The CoVs for σp and E drop below 20% for fairly small RVE sizes.
However, it appears that the ratio values (Eq. 8) for σp and E converge
for larger RVE sizes (> 40 mm3 ). Following the ±20% guidance from
Köchle and Schneebeli [2014], we decide to use an RVE size of at least
Fig. 4. Trends in different microstructural and mechanical properties as RVE size increases for three different regions in a μCT sample. The ratio values computed for
each quantity (Eq. 8) are represented as solid lines with different markers for each μCT region. The CoV values (Eq. 9) are represented as dashed lines. Image a shows
the trend in density, image b shows the trend in SSA, image c shows the trend in peak stress, and image d show the trend in elastic modulus.
7
Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055
40 mm3 for our simulations. For RVEs of this size and larger, the CoV for
each quantity is less than 7%, which is less than the 40% CoV threshold
used in Chandel et al. [2015]. The exact RVE volume we use is
42.4 mm3 , which corresponds to a cylinder with a diameter of 3 mm
and height of 6 mm. Although there is quite a range in the reported RVE
sizes, a size of 42.4 mm3 is within the range of values for RG snow re­
ported by Hagenmuller [2011], Chandel et al. [2014], and Hagenmuller
et al. [2014a].
5.3. Unconfined compression tests
Once we established the appropriate material point resolution and
RVE size, we simulated multiple unconfined compression tests to
investigate if the model can replicate different observations from the
literature. One of the first things we investigated was the affect of sc on
the modeled response. Fig. 5 shows the stress versus engineering strain
curves of three different microstructure regions under a strain rate of 0.1
− 1
s , and using different sc values. The μCT image set used for these model
domains were of a snow sample that had sintered for 7 days. The curves
with blue markers are simulations using the Griffith theory sc listed in
Table 1, the gray marker curves are the same simulations but with a
critical stretch that is 50% of the original value (sc = 4.142 × 10− 3 ), and
the orange marker curves use a critical stretch that is 10% of the original
value (sc = 8.283 × 10− 4 ).
B. West et al. Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055

− 1
Fig. 5. The stress-strain response for three different snow microstructures under compression with a strain rate of 0.1 s . The blue marker curves correspond to
simulations using a sc of 8.283 × 10− 3 , the gray curves were simulated with a sc of 4.142 × 10− 3 , and the orange marker curves were simulated with a value of 8.283 ×
10− 4 . (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

It is clear from comparing the stress-strain curves in Fig. 5 that Fig. 6 shows that the model produces a range of compressive
decreasing sc reduces the compressive strength of the sample. The peak strengths for the different microstructures. The peak stresses range be­
stresses of the simulations with the original critical stretch value range tween approximately 50 KPa and 120 KPa, which all fall within the
between 778 KPa and 896 KPa, whereas the 50% reduced simulations ranges reported by Mellor [1974]. In addition, failure was reached
have peak stresses between 407 KPa and 474 KPa, and the 10% simu­
lations produced peak stresses between 85 KPa and 99 KPa. Fig. 17 in
Mellor [1974] shows the trend of compressive strength versus density Table 2
for dry snow under uniaxial compression with strain rates between Measured elastic moduli and sample densities for each region simulated in
compression. These values correspond to the stress-strain curves in Fig. 6.
0.0001 and 0.01 s − 1 . For densities similar to that of this sample
(∼ 385 kg/m3 ), the figure in Mellor [1974] indicates that the Sample ρ (kg/m3 ) E (MPa)
compressive strength should fall in the range of 50 KPa to 200 KPa. The 3 Day, Region 1 391.3 93.0
sc value calculated following Griffith fracture theory resulted in peak 3 Day, Region 2 395.5 93.9
stresses that were approximately four times larger than the values in 3 Day, Region 3 397.5 102.5
7 Day, Region 1 384.6 113.2
Mellor [1974]. However, the reduced critical stretch simulations (sc =
7 Day, Region 2 385.6 117.9
8.283 × 10− 4 ) were within the range of what is expected. 7 Day, Region 3 384.4 126.6
Next, we used this reduced sc value and simulated a number of 17 Day, Region 1 448.2 122.2
different snow samples under compression. These samples were from the 17 Day, Region 2 460.2 132.1
17 Day, Region 3 452.3 142.5
same sieved sample described in Section 4, but were allowed to sinter at
30 Day, Region 1 388.6 76.9
15 ∘ F (− 9.4 ∘ C) for different amounts of time (3 days, 17 days, 30 days, 30 Day, Region 2 411.6 101.1
and 80 days). We used the same image segmentation and material point 30 Day, Region 3 413.3 102.7
creation process outlined in Section 4 to create these numerical samples. 80 Day, Region 1 396.8 86.0
For each sample we extracted three regions, which resulted in 15 total 80 Day, Region 2 414.8 99.8
80 Day, Region 3 425.6 117.0
data sets including the sc = 8.283 × 10− 4 data in Fig. 5 (sintered for 7
days).

1
Fig. 6. The stress-strain response for several different snow microstructures under compression with a strain rate of 0.1 s− and a sc of 8.283 × 10− 4 . The marker
shapes correspond to the region markers in Fig. 5.

8
B. West et al.
within 1% strain, matching the observations of Kinosita [1967]. Almost
all of the stress-strain curves exhibit only one stress peak followed by a
smaller residual stress, matching the observations of Salm [1982]. This
is a function of the snow microstructure crumbling away due to the
unconfined nature of these simulations. Although the slopes of the
elastic responses vary slightly for each microstructure region, the
moduli all fall within the values reported in Shapiro et al. [1997] and
Gerling et al. [2017] for their corresponding densities. The measured
elastic moduli and sample densities for each region are listed in Table 2.
5.4. Material damage evolution
Fig. 7 illustrates how damage develops within the peridynamic snow
microstructure. This dataset is from a simulation using a strain rate of
0.1 s − 1 . Images a, b, and c show all of the material points within the
sample that have more than 5% damage, with the non-damaged points
shown as slightly transparent. Images a and b show the sample's damage
state leading up to failure, and image c shows the microstructure that is
still attached to the platens at the end of the simulation. The material
points that crumbled out of the sample were not visualized for clarity
purposes. It is clear that before complete failure (images a and b), there
are damaged points spread across the sample including several clusters
of highly-damaged points. As the microstructure gets closer to failing,
these highly-damaged regions grow in size and often connect with
adjacent regions and form failure surfaces until, eventually, the micro­
structure is damaged enough that the column collapses. The growth of
the damage regions is apparent by comparing images a and b. The
Fig. 7. Examples of damaged regions within modeled snow microstructure. Images a and b show the distribution of damaged regions across the column before the
specimen ultimately fails. Image c shows the set of material points still connected to the platens at the end of the simulation. Note the 45 − 45 − 90∘ triangle guide
illustrating the angle of the fracture surface. Image d shows zoomed in regions of damaged neck regions between different colored grains. Note the damage colorbar
spanning from 0% damage to 50% damage.
9
Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055
damaged microstructure in image c corresponds to the observations of
Kinosita [1967], Fukue [1977], Kabore and Peters [2020] that cylin­
drical samples of snow failing in a brittle manner exhibit non-uniform
fractures that form primarily near one end of the sample. This general
behavior was observed in all simulations, with the majority of fracture
surfaces forming near the bottom platen, and many instances of fracture
surfaces oriented along ∼ 45∘ . Image d shows zoomed-in images of two
clusters of highly-damaged points, where the bonded ice grains were
manually extracted and colored different shades of gray for clarity. In
these cases the damaged points have formed within the neck regions
between sintered snow grains. In the bottom example, a cluster of highly
damaged points occurred at a triple junction between grains.
6. Discussion
We conducted material point resolution and RVE studies to deter­
mine the respective modeling properties for peridynamic simulations of
snow. The results of the resolution study in Section 5.1 show that we can
coarsen the input μCT data by a factor of two and still retain important
microstructural properties. This allows us to greatly reduce the number
of points in our simulations (by an average of 8.2 times fewer points),
and subsequently improve the computational efficiency of the model. In
addition, the results of the RVE study in Section 5.2 show that the
required domain size for our peridynamic model is on the order of those
reported for mechanical FEM and DEM models of rounded snow. These
analyses provide the basis for future applications of peridynamics for
snow simulations.
B. West et al.
The results in Section 5.3 show that the peridynamic model is able to
match observations in the literature for snow's elastic properties when
using a critical stretch sc = 8.283 × 10− 4 , as well as snow's brittle failure
at high strain rates. It is able to replicate realistic elastic moduli values
for the sample's densities (Table 2) when using the standard material
properties for ice (Table 1). Therefore, we avoid the time-consuming
process of tuning the model's properties to capture an appropriate
elastic response. Once failure begins, it simulates realistic stress-strain
curves for snow in compression, and captures the abrupt decreases in
stress associated with fracture surfaces forming and many still-bonded
grains crumbling out of the microstructure.
One of the more significant aspects of the peridynamics model is
where damage develops within the microstructure. Whereas DEM
models only allow the microstructure to fail within bonds, and some
FEM models of snow pre-compute the crack paths, fracture in the peri­
dynamic model is not predetermined. As shown in Fig. 7, the largest
clusters of damage points develop due to stress concentrations within
the thin neck regions between snow grains, matching observations of the
snow failure process in the literature [Kirchner et al., 2001; Hagen­
muller et al., 2014b]. These damaged neck regions correspond very
closely to the damaged regions in Fig. 9 of Chandel et al. [2015] and
Fig. 1d of Hagenmuller et al. [2014b]. However, a benefit to the peri­
dynamic model is that damage can sever the bonds and allow the grains
to move apart and slide against each other, whereas the damaged re­
gions in Chandel et al. [2015] remain connected through an FEM mesh.
In addition, we avoid the need to pre-compute crack paths, as in
Hagenmuller et al. [2014b]. The model also simulates the propagation
of failure surfaces connecting different damaged neck regions within the
microstructure, matching observations from physical experiments. This
indicates the peridynamic model is able to replicate key aspects of how
sintered bonds fail within the snow microstructure. The model also
produces fracture surfaces near one end of the sample while the
remainder is left intact, matching experimental observations [Kinosita,
1967].
Despite some promising preliminary results, there are a number of
things to investigate further for applications of peridynamics to snow.
We have shown that the model fits the observations for brittle failure of
the second kind, however there is limited high strain rate data available
in the literature for one-to-one comparisons. Although our focus is on
high strain rates for vehicle mobility purposes, future projects could
investigate the model's ability to capture the low strain rate ductile
behavior, as well as the transition between ductile and brittle failure
regimes. As noted earlier, a saw-tooth stress-strain response is often
noted for lower strain rates within the brittle regime. We see evidence of
stress rebounds in some of the stress-strain curves in Fig. 6. However, the
brittle failure was quite catastrophic, and the columns quickly collapsed.
This did not allow for the stress to increase again, as there was no snow
remaining to support the load. Future projects could investigate if the
model can capture the characteristic saw-tooth pattern for brittle failure
of the first kind at lower strain rates. An important aspect of these lower
strain rate applications, and in particular the saw-tooth behavior, is
accurately modeling fast metamorphism between grains that come into
contact as the snow is compressed. Although it is beyond the scope of
this current paper, future studies could develop the functionality to
make new peridynamic bonds within a Peridigm simulation in order to
study the effect of fast metamorphism on the modeled response. In
addition, the LPS material model is purely elastic, and therefore incor­
porating the temporal effect of fast metamorphism would likely require
investigation of Peridigm's “Viscoelastic” material model.
Perhaps one of the most important aspects for these simulations is
the damage model, which determines when the bonds between material
points begin to fail. We mentioned earlier that the critical stretch value is
calculated following Griffith fracture theory. However, the results in
Fig. 5 show that this value produces snow strengths that are too high. An
10
Cold Regions Science and Technology 218 (2024) 104055
important caveat with Griffith theory is that it determines if a pre-
existing crack tip will propagate, and does not determine if a crack
will initiate [Rädel et al., 2017]. Although this approach has been used
in the peridynamic literature for crack initiation in brittle materials,
applying this theory to snow applications needs to be investigated
further. Comparing the different critical stretch results in Fig. 5 indicates
that the strength scales linearly with critical stretch. Therefore, it may be
possible to scale sc in order to achieve a desired snow strength. For
example, to obtain compressive strengths that matched values for snow
from the literature, we had to reduce the critical stretch value to 10% of
the original value.
It is possible that other damage models are more suitable for snow
applications than the standard “Critical Stretch” damage model in Per­
idigm. Potential alternatives within Peridigm include the “Time
Dependent Critical Stretch” damage model, which uses a critical stretch
value that can evolve in time, and the “Critical Energy” model, which
evaluates the energy density within each bond [Foster et al., 2011].
However, both critical stretch failure models in Peridigm only account
for normal stretching of the bonds, and no shear effects. Another po­
tential option is to adapt the Mohr-Coulomb with Cap (MCC) failure
model presented in Chandel et al. [2015], which accounts for failure due
to shear stresses in addition to normal stresses. Chandel et al. [2015]
showed that the MCC model was able to capture realistic snow failure.
Investigating alternative damage models is an important research
avenue for further validation of peridynamic applications for snow.
Once the peridynamic bonds have fractured and the material points
are no longer bonded to their neighbors, they interact following a con­
tact model. However, the developers of Peridigm acknowledge that
peridynamic contact models are currently an open area of research
[Littlewood, 2015]. Recently, models incorporating peridynamics and
DEM under one framework, as in Davis et al. [2022] and Hartmann et al.
[2022], have extended this idea to facilitate peridynamic bodies that
also interact with many other objects. These advancements could
improve future peridynamic simulations of snow, and in particular the
granular behavior after yield. For this study, we are particularly inter­
ested in modeling the response of snow up until failure, and less inter­
ested in the behavior after failure. Therefore, we leave these
investigations for future projects.
7. Conclusions
We are interested in simulating the behavior of snow under high
strain applications, with the ultimate goal of creating a model to facil­
itate research of vehicle mobility in snow. It is well known that snow
behaves in a brittle manner at high strain rates, and that the brittle
fracture is exhibited by large amounts of material failure. Therefore, we
investigated the utility of peridynamics; a modeling approach that is
well adapted for simulations of fracturing materials. Peridynamics can
incorporate more accurate geometric representations of snow micro­
structure than previous modeling approaches by directly inputting
coarsened μCT voxels as material points. This avoids simplification of
the grain and sintered bond geometries, which play important roles in
snow's micromechanical response. We showed that our peridynamic
model requires an RVE size of at least 40 mm3 , which is within the RVE
sizes stated in the literature for other snow modeling approaches, and
that we can use material point resolution on the order of 40 μm. These
analyses provide an important basis for future applications of peridy­
namics for snow research.
We highlighted the significance of the critical stretch parameter on
the compressive strength of these models, and that additional research is
needed to determine optimal failure models for applications of peridy­
namics to snow. Quantitative data for high strain rate simulations
(≥ 0.1 s− 1 ) is limited within the literature, making it difficult to directly
B. West et al.
compare our simulated results to experiments. However, we showed
that the model produces elastic moduli values that closely match re­
ported values, and is able to replicate several aspects of snow's brittle
failure of the second kind from earlier research [Yosida et al., 1958;
Kinosita, 1967; de Montmollin, 1982; Salm, 1982]. We also showed that
peridynamics is able to replicate failure within the thin sintered bond
regions of the microstructure without any explicit preconditioning for
failure in those regions. In a follow on project, we plan to use image
segmentation methods to label ice voxels versus sintered bond voxels,
and compress them to further investigate the role of sintered bonds and
how their properties affect the macroscopic failure of snow samples.
Future work will use high strain rate experiments to further validate the
simulated results presented here, as well as further investigate the role of
sintered bonds in snow's macroscopic strength.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Brendan West: Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis,
Investigation, Software, Writing – original draft. Taylor Hodgdon:
Conceptualization, Data curation, Writing – original draft. Devin
O'Connor: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Writing – review
& editing. Julie Parno: Data curation, Writing – review & editing. Zoe
Courville: Data curation, Writing – review & editing.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Data availability
We use the open-source peridynamics library called Peridigm from
Sandia National Laboratories for our simulations [Parks et al., 2012;
Littlewood et al., 2023]. The software is stored in a Github repository
located at https://github.com/peridigm/peridigm/. As of initial sub­
mission of this manuscript, we used the most recent version of the code
on the master branch of the Github (commit d369819). The input ge­
ometry files for our simulations, as well as the μCT images used to create
them, are available in a public repository at https://github.
com/erdc/Snow-Peridigm. Example input YAML files used for our sim­
ulations of each region are also provided in this repository.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the U.S. Army Program Element
0601102A [Task number SAB202]. We would like to thank the re­
viewers and editors for their careful review and constructive feedback.
We would like to acknowledge and thank the Engineer Research and
Development Center (ERDC) DoD Supercomputing Resource Center
(DSRC) for their computing resources and assistance with installing
Peridigm on a high-performance computing cluster.
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