The aim of the PhD thesis has been the development of two multi-physics models based on common theoretical basis, but applied to two very different areas: i) the study of the behavior of concrete at early age, essentially for the prevention of early cracking and related issues- ii) the analysis of physical, chemical and biological processes that govern growth and development of cancer. The development of a numerical tool to model concrete at early age is of great importance for the design of durable and sustainable structures. The model has been implemented on the finite element code CAST3M (developed by CEA), also it was validated and nowadays allows multiple applications: study of stresses and cracking phenomena in young concrete, thermal and hygral gradients, autogenous and drying shrinkage, inhibition of hydration caused by drying, creep, stress redistribution, study repairs, etc.. In the fight against cancer, it is clear that the advance of medical strategies based on numerical analysis have a critical scientific interest and can have a great social impact. The equations which govern the thermo-hydro-chemo-mechanical behavior of concrete at early age have may formal analogies with those used to model tumor growth. Hence, these equations have been readapted and a novel mathematical model for tumor growth has been developed. The model was implemented in Cast3M and the first numerical results have been encouraging since very close to the experimental data present in the literature.
