TY - JOUR
T1 - Shrinkage mechanisms of alkali-activated slag
AU - Ye, Hailong
AU - Radlińska, Aleksandra
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) under Award CMMI # 1265789 . Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2016/10/1
Y1 - 2016/10/1
N2 - In this work, the physical and chemical changes of alkali-activated slag (AAS) after a prolonged drying treatment under various relative humidity (RH) conditions were studied. The results show that the shrinkage kinetics of AAS is strongly dependent on the RH, but irrespective of the moisture loss. At high RH, AAS exhibits a pronounced viscous characteristic, which is likely due to the rearrangement and reorganization of calcium-alumina-silicate-hydrate (C-A-S-H). Meantime, micropore closure, silicate polymerization, and new interlayer formation were observed during microstructure rearrangement, indicating a strong interaction between adjacent C-A-S-H particles. The large shrinkage in AAS may be attributed to the structural incorporation of alkali cations in C-A-S-H, which reduces the stacking regularity of C-A-S-H layers and makes the C-A-S-H easier to collapse and redistribute upon drying.
AB - In this work, the physical and chemical changes of alkali-activated slag (AAS) after a prolonged drying treatment under various relative humidity (RH) conditions were studied. The results show that the shrinkage kinetics of AAS is strongly dependent on the RH, but irrespective of the moisture loss. At high RH, AAS exhibits a pronounced viscous characteristic, which is likely due to the rearrangement and reorganization of calcium-alumina-silicate-hydrate (C-A-S-H). Meantime, micropore closure, silicate polymerization, and new interlayer formation were observed during microstructure rearrangement, indicating a strong interaction between adjacent C-A-S-H particles. The large shrinkage in AAS may be attributed to the structural incorporation of alkali cations in C-A-S-H, which reduces the stacking regularity of C-A-S-H layers and makes the C-A-S-H easier to collapse and redistribute upon drying.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.cemconres.2016.07.001
DO - 10.1016/j.cemconres.2016.07.001
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84978208673
SN - 0008-8846
VL - 88
SP - 126
EP - 135
JO - Cement and Concrete Research
JF - Cement and Concrete Research
ER -