Preface to the special issue on material instabilities and micromechanics – Energy methods, instabilities, microstructures and thermodynamics of dissipative solids

In this study a computational framework is outlined for modeling the mechanical response of structural masonry at both meso and macroscale. The mesoscale approach accounts for the presence of distinct constituents (i.e., bricks and mortar joints) and their geometric arrangement. A constitutive law with embedded discontinuity, combined with the level-set approach, is used to model the onset and discrete propagation of localized damage in these...