Related papers: Vibrations and waves in soft dielectric elastomer …

We present a new finite deformation, dynamic finite element model that incorporates surface tension to capture elastocapillary effects on the electromechanical deformation of dielectric elastomers. We demonstrate the significant effect that…

In the field of soft dielectric elastomers, the notion electrostriction indicates the dependency of the permittivity on strain. The present paper is aimed at investigating the effects of electrostriction onto the stability behaviour of…

Flexible mechanical metamaterials possess repeating structural motifs that imbue them with novel, exciting properties including programmability, anomalous elastic moduli and nonlinear and robust response. We address such structures via…

Acoustic metamaterials offer exceptional control over wave propagation, but their potential remains unfulfilled due to fabrication constraints. Conventional processes yield mostly rigid, planar structures, whereas soft-matter alternatives…

Liquid crystal elastomers (LCEs) are soft phase-changing solids that exhibit large reversible contractions upon heating, Goldstone-like soft modes and resultant microstructural instabilities. We heat a planar LCE slab to isotropic, clamp…

Soft robots utilizing inflatable dielectric membranes can realize intricate functionalities through the application of non-mechanical fields. However, given the current limitations in simulations, including low computational efficiency and…

We propose bending energies for isotropic elastic plates and shells. For a plate, we define and employ a surface tensor that symmetrically couples stretch and curvature such that any elastic energy density constructed from its invariants is…

In this article we discuss the modelling of elastic and electromagnetic wave propagation through one- and two-dimensional structured piezoelectric solids. Dispersion and the effect of piezoelectricity on the group velocity and positions of…

Deformations of conventional solids are described via elasticity, a classical field theory whose form is constrained by translational and rotational symmetries. However, flexible metamaterials often contain an additional approximate…

Soft electronics are a promising and revolutionary alternative for traditional electronics when safe physical interaction between machines and the human body is required. Among various materials architectures developed for producing soft…

In biological and synthetic materials, many important processes involve charges that are present in a medium with spatially varying dielectric permittivity. To accurately understand the role of electrostatic interactions in such systems, it…

The study of granular crystals, metamaterials that consist of closely packed arrays of particles that interact elastically, is a vibrant area of research that combines ideas from disciplines such as materials science, nonlinear dynamics,…

We study the static and dynamic structure of thermally fluctuating elastic thin sheets by investigating the overdamped dynamic F\"oppl-von K\'arm\'an equation, in which the F\"oppl-von K\'arm\'an equation from elasticity theory is driven by…

Soft adhesive pads are needed for many robotics applications, and one approach is based on electroadhesion. Here we present a general analytic model and numerical results for electroadhesion for soft solids with arbitrary time-dependent…

Large deformations of soft elastic beads spinning at high angular velocity in a denser background fluid are investigated theoretically, numerically, and experimentally using millimeter-size polyacrylamide hydrogel particles introduced in a…

Limiting chain extensibility is a characteristic that plays a vital role in the stretching of highly elastic materials. The Gent model has been widely used to capture this behaviour, as it performs very well in fitting stress-stretch data…

Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) normally have fixed or moving structures with cross-sections of the order of microns ($\mu m$) and lengths of the order of tens or hundreds of microns. These structures are often plates or array of…

We propose and verify experimentally a new concept for achieving strong nonlinear coupling between the electromagnetic and elastic properties in metamaterials. This coupling is provided through a novel degree of freedom in metamaterial…

What characterises a solid is its way to respond to external stresses. Ordered solids, such crystals, display an elastic regime followed by a plastic one, both well understood microscopically in terms of lattice distortion and dislocations.…

Spatially confined rigid membranes reorganize their morphology in response to the imposed constraints. A crumpled elastic sheet presents a complex pattern of random folds focusing the deformation energy while compressing a membrane resting…