Advanced mechanical characterization of asphalt mastics containing tourmaline modifier Haibo Ding a,b , Ali Rahman a,b , Qiushi Li c,⇑ , Yanjun Qiu a,b a School of Civil Engineering, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu 610031, China b Highway Engineering Key Laboratory of Sichuan Province, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu 610031, China c School of Civil Engineering, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin 150040, Heilongjiang, China highlights  Evaluating the fundamental mechanical properties of tourmaline modified asphalt.  The performance discrepancies of different kinds of modifier are compared.  Physical properties of two kinds of commercial available tourmaline modifier are investigated.  Tourmaline ions powder is environment friendly alternative modifier. article info Article history: Received 13 March 2017 Received in revised form 28 April 2017 Accepted 24 May 2017 Keywords: Tourmaline Modifier Mineral filler Asphalt mastic Mechanical properties abstract Tourmaline modified bitumen as an environmentally friendly pavement material has got an increasing attention in recent years in China. In this regard, previous studies mainly focused on the linear viscoelas- tic properties of asphalt or asphalt mastic. In this paper, multiple stress creep and recovery (MSCR) test, linear amplitude sweep (LAS) test and double edge notched tension (DENT) test were adopted as funda- mental performance evaluation methods for high-temperature rutting, fatigue, and low-temperature thermal cracking of asphalt binder, respectively. Moreover, straight run asphalt and polymer modified asphalt containing various percentages of two kinds of tourmaline as asphalt modifier were also prepared to gain the knowledge of the interaction between asphalt and tourmaline. To study the feasibility of applying tourmaline as an alternative modifier and compare its performance with conventional fillers, asphalt mastic containing limestone was also prepared. The results show that small amount of modifier can enhance the mechanical properties of asphalt binder, but different modifiers do not have similar effect. In addition, market available tourmaline additive has different chemical composition and physical properties; asphalt mastic containing tourmaline ions powder showed the best performance among mod- ifiers utilized here. Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction At present, the development of low-carbon economy and con- struction of low-carbon society have become the primary focus of China and the world. With raising awareness about environmen- tal protection among the society and rapid economic growth dur- ing the past decades in China, more requirements for sustainable road materials have begun to put forward. Note that production of road materials is not just limited to the purpose of having good performance and durability. Consequently, having multifunctional pavement materials with low-carbon and eco-friendly properties become one of the main research directions of researchers. Over the past decades, for decreasing energy consumption and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, warm mix asphalt (WMA) [1,2], low- energy asphalt [3] and cold mix asphalt [4] widely employed. The design concept of most of the eco-friendly asphalt materials developed through adding a certain amount of additives with a special performance. Accordingly, the functional properties of cor- responding road materials mainly come from additives. Note that these additives not only enhance pavement performance but they should not have a detrimental effect on it in general. To reduce asphalt pavement surface temperature during severe solar radia- tion in summer, Hu et al. [5–9] systematically studied using ther- http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2017.05.203 0950-0618/Ó 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. ⇑ Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: dinghaibo@my.swjtu.edu.cn (H. Ding), a.rahman@my.swjtu. edu.cn (A. Rahman), shijiannimei@126.com (Q. Li), publicqiuyj@vip.163.com (Y. Qiu). Construction and Building Materials 150 (2017) 520–528 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Construction and Building Materials journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat