title: Failure avalanches in fiber bundles for discrete load increase.
abstract: The statistics of burst avalanche sizes n during failure processes in a fiber bundle follows a power law D(n) approximately n-xi for large avalanches. The exponent xi depends upon how the avalanches are provoked. While it is known that when the load on the bundle is increased in a continuous manner the exponent takes the value xi=52 , we show that when the external load is increased in discrete and not too small steps, the exponent value xi=3 is relevant. Our analytic treatment applies to bundles with a general probability distribution of the breakdown thresholds for the individual fibers. The preasymptotic size distribution of avalanches is also considered.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, N-7491 Trondheim, Norway. per.hemmer@ntnu.no
authors.forename: Per C
authors.initials: PC
authors.lastname: Hemmer
authors.forename: Srutarshi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Pradhan