Bounds for the time to failure of hierarchical systems of fracture

For years limited Monte Carlo simulations have led to the suspicion that th e time to failure of hierarchically organized load-transfer models of fract ure is nonzero for sets of infinite size. This fact could have profound sig nificance in engineering practice and also in geophysics. Here, we develop an exact algebraic iterative method to compute the successive time interval s for individual breaking in systems of height n in terms of the informatio n calculated in the previous height n-1. As a byproduct of this method, rig orous lower and higher bounds for the time to failure of very large systems are easily obtained. The asymptotic behavior of the resulting lower bound leads to the evidence that the above-mentioned suspicion is actually true. [S1063-651X(99)51402-5].