Study of the dielectric gradient values of reinforced concrete sample by considering radar measurements in an inverse problem

ABSTRACT

The goal of this study is to develop a tool that will evaluate the moisture content gradient in the depth of reinforced concretes in the context of building safety. The monitoring of ageing phenomena, such as the corrosion of steel reinforcements, depends on the amount of water and on its gradient as they are directly related to the dielectric values of the concrete. In this paper, to obtain these values, we propose to solve an inverse problem for reinforced concrete. First, an experimental device based on radar measurements is proposed with its 3D numerical model. Next, we describe an inverse process to determine a dielectric profile according to the depth and validate it on measured data obtained for control samples.

KEYWORDS:

• Maxwell's equation
• dielectric characterization of concrete
• inverse problem
• GPR

2010 MATHEMATICS SUBJECT CLASSIFICATIONS:

• Inverse problem
• electromagnetic
• optimization
• EDP

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the French Agency of Research for their financial support of the CONTINUS project. Our thanks are extended to Susan Becker, a native English speaker, commissioned to proofread the final English version of this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.