2. Body rheology and its impact on material removal mechanisms

In order to be able to discuss the mechanical aspects of abrasion mentioned in paragraph and dealt with in greater detail later on, we provide a brief reminder of the basic concepts required to understand them. To this end, we briefly present tensile tests (§ ), then indentation (hardness) tests (§ ) and the various mechanical quantities that these two tests can measure. Readers can find a more detailed presentation of these tests in the articles under the heading "Mechanical testing of metals". Describing the behavior of various materials under indentation finally enables us to tackle the microscopic description of abrasion processes in paragraph .