Related papers: Elastic-brittle reinforcement of flexural structur…
Soft solids exhibit instability and develop surface undulations due to surface effects, a phenomenon known as the elastic Plateau-Rayleigh (PR) instability, driven by the interplay of surface and bulk elasticity. Previous studies on the PR…
We consider a family of linearly elastic shells with thickness $2\varepsilon$ (where $\varepsilon$ is a small parameter). The shells are clamped along a portion of their lateral face, all having the same middle surface $S$, and may enter in…
Recent experiments have shown that surface stresses in soft materials can have a significant strain-dependence. Here we explore the implications of this surface elasticity to show how, and when, we expect it to arise. We develop the…
We investigate the equilibrium configurations of closed planar elastic curves of fixed length, whose stiffness, also known as the bending rigidity, depends on an additional density variable. The underlying variational model relies on the…
We investigate the conditions leading to large drag force fluctuations in granular materials. The study is based on a set of experimental drag tests, which involve pulling a plate vertically through a cohesionless granular material. In…
The archetypal instability of a structure is associated with the eponymous Euler beam, modeled as an inextensible curve which exhibits a supercritical bifurcation at a critical compressive load. In contrast, a soft compressible beam is…
Experimentally measuring the elastic properties of thin biological surfaces is non-trivial, particularly when they are curved. One technique that may be used is the indentation of a thin sheet of material by a rigid indenter, whilst…
An asymptotic analysis is performed for thin anisotropic elastic plate clamped along its lateral side and also supported at a small area $\theta_{h}$ of one base with diameter of the same order as the plate thickness $h\ll1.$ A…
The paper studies the initial boundary value problem related to the dynamic evolution of an elastic beam interacting with a substrate through an elastic-breakable forcing term. This discontinuous interaction is aimed to model the phenomenon…
Shells, i.e., objects made of a thin layer of material following a surface, are among the most common structures in use. They are highly efficient, in terms of material required to maintain strength, but also prone to deformation and…
We study stationary points of the bending energy of curves $\gamma\colon[a,b]\to\mathbb{R}^n$ subject to constraints on the arc-length and the curve's holonomy while simultaneously allowing for a variable bending stiffness along the…
Several experiments have demonstrated the existence of an electro-mechanical effect in many biological tissues and hydrogels, and its actual influence on growth, migration, and pattern formation. Here, to model these interactions and…
Manipulating elastic waves using a transformation approach is challenging due to the complex constitutive relationship. However, for flexural waves, approximated as scalar waves, two straightforward approaches emerge based on geometric…
Through experiments, we idealise a plant leaf as a flexible, thin, rectangular plate clamped at the midpoint and positioned perpendicular to an airflow. Flexibility of the structure is considered as an advantage at moderate flow speed…
A comprehensive study has been undertaken on the dimensional swelling of graphene-reinforced elastomers in liquids. Anisotropic swelling was observed for samples reinforced with graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs), induced by the in-plane…
Developing adhesives whose bond strength can be externally manipulated is a topic of considerable interest for practical and scientific purposes. In this work, we propose a method of controlling the adhesion force of a regular fluid, such…
A rigidity theory is developed for bar-joint frameworks in $\mathbb{R}^{d+1}$ whose vertices are constrained to lie on concentric $d$-spheres with independently variable radii. In particular, combinatorial characterisations are established…
Euler buckling is the elastic instability of a column subjected to longitudinal compression forces at its ends. The buckling instability occurs when the compressing load reaches a critical value and an infinitesimal fluctuation leads to a…
The production of mechanical stresses in living organisms largely relies on localized, force-generating active units embedded in filamentous matrices. Numerical simulations of discrete fiber networks with fixed boundaries have shown that…
The mechanical behaviour of graphene flakes under both tension and compression is examined using a cantilever-beam arrangement. Two different sets of samples were employed involving flakes just supported on a plastic bar but also embedded…