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We study the dynamics of the solid to liquid transition for a model material made of elastic particles immersed in a viscous fluid. The interaction between particle surfaces includes their viscous lubrication, a sharp repulsion when they…
Over the past decade or two, the concept has emerged of using multiple types of weak interactions simultaneously to enhance the mechanical properties of elastomers. These weak interactions include physical entanglements, hydrogen bonds,…
We introduce a class of continuum mechanical models aimed at describing the behaviour of viscoelastic fluids by incorporating concepts originated in the theory of solid plasticity. Within this class, even a simple model with constant…
Aging populations and the rising prevalence of neurological and musculoskeletal disorders increase the demand for wearable mobility assistive devices that are effective, comfortable, and anatomically compatible. Many existing systems use…
Two dimensional simulations of non-cohesive granular matter in a biaxial shear tester are discussed. The effect of particle elasticity on the mechanical behavior is investigated using two complementary distinct element methods (DEM): Soft…
Soft materials are known to deform due to a variety of mechanisms, including capillarity, buoyancy, and swelling. In this paper, we present experiments on polyvinylsiloxane gel threads partially-immersed in three liquids with different…
Elastic properties and internal states of isotropic sphere packings are studied by numerical simulations. Several numerical protocols to assemble dense configurations are compared. One, which imitates experiments with lubricated contacts,…
Elastic interactions arising from a difference of lattice spacing between two coherent phases can have a strong influence on the phase separation (coarsening) of alloys. If the elastic moduli are different in the two phases, the elastic…
A mesoscopic model for shear plasticity of amorphous materials in two dimensions is introduced, and studied through numerical simulations in order to elucidate the macroscopic (large scale) mechanical behavior. Plastic deformation is…
The stretchability of polymeric materials is critical to many applications such as stretchable electronics and soft robotics, yet the stretchability of conventional cross-linked linear polymers is limited by the entanglements between…
The elastic behavior of materials operating in the linear regime is constrained, by definition, to operations that are linear in the imposed deformation. Though the nonlinear regime holds promise for new functionality, the design in this…
The macroscopic properties of polymeric fluids are inherited from the material properties of the fibers embedded in the solvent. The behavior of such passive fibers in flow has been of interest in a wide range of systems, including cellular…
Compression of soft bodies is central to biology, materials science, and robotics, yet existing contact theories break down at large deformations. Here, we develop a general framework for soft-body compression by extending the method of…
Vitrimers are a special class of polymers that undergo dynamic cross-linking under thermal stimuli. Their ability to exchange covalent bonds can be harnessed to mitigate damage in a composite or to achieve recyclable aerospace composites.…
When a liquid droplet completely wets a hard substrate, its spreading dynamics follow Tanner's law, with the droplet radius growing as the one-tenth power of time. Here, we investigate how these dynamics change when silicone oil droplets…
Biological membranes are elastic media in which the presence of a transmembrane protein leads to local bilayer deformation. The energetics of deformation allow two membrane proteins in close proximity to influence each other's equilibrium…
Soft materials capable of large inelastic deformation play an essential role in high-performance nacre-inspired architectured materials with a combination of stiffness, strength and toughness. The rigid "building blocks" made from glass or…
Change in the interatomic spacing of a two-atom system under tension and compression has been modelled by the elastic deformation of atoms. The critical elastic strain of atoms before separation or cracking from tension was estimated by the…
We investigate the dissipative mechanisms exhibited by creased material sheets when subjected to mechanical loading, which comes in the form of plasticity and relaxation phenomena within the creases. After demonstrating that plasticity…
Experiments on isotropic compression of a granular assembly of spheres show that the shear and bulk moduli vary with the confining pressure faster than the 1/3 power law predicted by Hertz-Mindlin effective medium theories (EMT) of contact…