Related papers: Constitutive Laws and Failure Models for Compact B…

Mechanical densification of granular bodies is a process in which a loose material becomes increasingly cohesive as the applied pressure increases. A constitutive description of this process faces the formidable problem that granular and…

The self-assembly of particles into organized structures is a key feature of living organisms and a major engineering challenge. While it may proceed through the binding of perfectly matched, puzzle-pieces-like particles, many other…

The paper investigates localized deformation patterns resulting from the onset of instabilities in lattice structures. The study is motivated by previous observations on discrete hexagonal lattices, where the onset of non-uniform,…

We consider the dynamics of lattices which have constrained constitutive units flexible in only their mutual orientations. A continuum description is derived through which it is shown that the models have zero shear velocity, free-particle…

The application of hybrid composites in lightweight engineering enables the combination of material-specific advantages of fiber-reinforced polymers and classical metals. The interface between the connected materials is of particular…

This work describes models and numerical approximations that describe the mechanical behavior of deformable continua with embedded structural members, such as rigid bodies, beams, shells, etc. The continuum formulation extends an idea first…

Modular Active Cell Robots (MACROs) are a design paradigm for modular robotic hardware that uses only two components, namely actuators and passive compliant joints. Under the MACRO approach, a large number of actuators and joints are…

The accuracy and fidelity of deformation simulations are highly dependent upon the underlying constitutive material model. Commonly used linear or nonlinear constitutive material models only cover a tiny part of possible material behavior.…

Bone is mineralized tissue constituting the skeletal system, supporting and protecting body organs and tissues. At the molecular level, mineralized collagen fibril is the basic building block of bone tissue, and hence, understanding bone…

We study experimentally the fracture mechanisms of a model cohesive granular medium consisting of glass beads held together by solidified polymer bridges. The elastic response of this material can be controlled by changing the cross-linking…

We consider a simple one-dimensional time-dependent model for bone regeneration in the presence of a bio-resorbable polymer scaffold. Within the framework of the model, we optimize the effective mechanical stiffness of the polymer scaffold…

Over the last half-century, linear viscoelastic models for crack growth in soft solids have flourished but their predictions have rarely been compared to experiments. In fact, most available models are either very approximate or cast in…

Heterogeneous materials are often organized in a hierarchical manner, where a basic unit is repeated over multiple scales.The structure then acquires a self-similar pattern. Examples of such structure are found in various biological and…

The mechanical properties of soft matter are of great importance in countless applications, in addition of being an active field of academic research. Given the relative ease with which soft materials can be deformed, their non-linear…

The protein folding problem must ultimately be solved on all length scales from the atomic up through a hierarchy of complicated structures. By analyzing the stability of the folding process using physics and mathematics, this paper shows…

We introduce a model constitutive law for the dissipative stress tensor of lamellar phases to account for low frequency and long wavelength flows. Given the uniaxial symmetry of these phases, we argue that the stress tensor must be the same…

We present a three dimensional, time dependent model for bone regeneration in the presence of porous scaffolds to bridge critical size bone defects. Our approach uses homogenized quantities, thus drastically reducing computational cost…

Compression stiffening, or an increase in shear modulus with increasing compressive strain, has been observed in recent rheometry experiments on brain, liver, and fat tissues. Here, we extend the known types of biomaterials exhibiting this…

We introduce a continuous damage fiber bundle model that gives rise to macroscopic plasticity and compare its behavior with that of dry fiber bundles. Several interesting constitutive behaviors are found in this model depending on the value…

We investigate the fracture behavior of pre-cracked triangular beam-lattices whose elements have failure stresses drawn from a Weibull distribution. Through a statistical analysis and numerical simulations, we identify and verify the…