Zapata Orduz et al., Cogent Engineering (2016), 3: 1260952 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/23311916.2016.1260952 CIVIL & ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING | RESEARCH ARTICLE Compatibility analysis between Portland cement type I and micro/nano-SiO 2 in the presence of polycarboxylate-type superplasticizers Luis E. Zapata Orduz 1 *, Genock Portela 2 , Oscar Marcelo Suárez 2 and Arsenio D. Cáceres 3 Abstract: This study, assessed the interaction between Portland cement type I and polycarboxylate-type superplasticizers. Five systems were analyzed with the cement- superplasticizer pair being selected from the viewpoint of its rheological behavior using the Marsh cone test. The rheological behavior was analyzed using plain and mineral additions of 5, 10 and 15 wt% and 1, 2, and 3 wt% of silica fume (SF) and nanosilica (nS), respectively. Mechanical and rheological validations were carried out in binary-concretes with nS or SF. The results showed that addition of amorphous silica in diferent particle sizes has very diferent rheological results. Particularly, in SF-concretes, the samples exhibited higher susceptibility to bleeding and segrega- tion for higher SF amounts. This limited the application of high SP dosages, but this fact induced a premature slump loss even at the early age. In contrast, nS-concretes tended to have less bleeding, increased packing density and enhanced cohesive- ness of the cement matrix. Therefore, higher SP dosages were possible. The results also showed that when mineral additions are applied in concrete mixes the Marsh cone test results of cement pastes must be interpreted carefully. For SF-concretes the numerical results were efectively anticipated by using the Marsh methodology. *Corresponding author: Luis E. Zapata Orduz, School of Civil Engineering, Universidad Industrial de Santander, Cra 27 Cll 9 Bucaramanga, Colombia E-mail: luisezap@uis.edu.co Reviewing editor: Anand J. Puppala, University of Texas at Arlington, USA Additional information is available at the end of the article ABOUT THE AUTHOR Dr Luis E. Zapata-Orduz is Associate Professor in Materials and Structural Engineering, School of Civil Engineering, Universidad Industrial de Santander, Bucaramanga-Colombia. He earned his PhD degree from University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez Campus, PR-USA. He has published related papers in materials and statistical methods to analyze the failures of concrete. He has several posters and conferences proceedings in the feld of the present paper. Nowadays, the author is investigating the behavior of nanoparticles of silica in civil structures in conjuction with the Nanotechnology Center of the University of Puerto Rico–Mayagüez. The Nanotechnology Center is a major endeavor supported by the US National Science Foundation dedicated to the creation of novel nanostructured materials intended for biomedical, environmental, and sustainable applications. In particular, the development of high performance concrete modifed with nanoparticles opens the door to the fabrication of efcient building materials with smaller carbon footprint. PUBLIC INTEREST STATEMENT Concrete is the most widely used construction material in the world. The primary constituents of concrete are cement, sand, aggregate, and water. In addition, chemical (e.g. superplasticizers) and mineral admixtures (e.g. silica fume or nanoparticles) are often used to modify some physical/chemical properties of concrete. The Portland cement is worldwide the main cementing material, but the energy required to produce a ton of cement is approximately equivalent to emit a ton of CO 2 . One of the directions going on to make reductions in CO 2 is to reduce the cement in concrete by adding products such as silica fume. In this sense, the present work report some fndings concerning with the behavior of the fresh/ hardened state in superplasticized-cement pastes with silica or nanoparticles. The importance of this research relies in determine the compatibility between the cementing materials and chemical/ mineral admixtures at the level of the cement paste, before the concrete be cast. By doing this type of experiments the carbon emissions to the environment are reduced. Received: 03 August 2016 Accepted: 08 November 2016 First Published: 16 November 2016 © 2016 The Author(s). This open access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 license. Page 1 of 18