Events Calendar

AME Seminar

Speaker: Pedro Ponte Castaneda, University of Pennsylvania

Talk Title: Soft Elastic Composites: Microstructure evolution, macroscopic multi-physics response, instabilities and associated soft modes

Abstract: Soft elastic composite materials can undergo large deformations under normal operating conditions and, in many applications, such as in robotics and prosthetics applications, they are designed with the objective of undergoing controlled deformation by means of externally applied magnetic, electrical, pneumatic or other types of fields. They include porous, particle- and fiber-reinforced rubbers, thermoplastic and magnetorheological elastomers, dielectric elastomer composites, polymer foams, muscle and other biological tissues. As a consequence of the finite deformations involved, their microstructure evolves with the deformation and their constitutive or rheological behavior can be highly nonlinear and strongly anisotropic. This presents a challenge for the application of homogenization methods, which were originally developed to characterize the effective material parameters of composites, such as, for example, the thermal conductivity of a two-phase composite material, or the Young’s modulus of an isotropic metal polycrystal. In this presentation, I will give an overview of several methods that have been recently developed to characterize the multi-physics constitutive response of soft composites, as well as the evolution of the microstructure and the possible development of instabilities in such material systems. In addition, I will present some explicit examples, including those leading to a certain type of ‘twining’ instabilities and associated soft modes of deformation.

Biography: Pedro Ponte Castañeda is Raymond S. Markowitz Faculty Fellow and Professor in the departments of Mechanical Engineering & Applied Mechanics, as well as Member ofthe Graduate Group in Applied Mathematics & Computational Science at the University of Pennsylvania. He earned a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering and a B.A. in Mathematicsfrom Lehigh University in 1982, and an S.M. in Engineering Sciences and a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from Harvard University in 1983 and 1986, respectively. Prior to joining Penn, he was Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the Johns Hopkins University (1987-90). He was also Professor of Mechanics at the École Polytechnique (2004-06). He has held visiting positions at the C.N.R.S. in Marseilles, the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics and Corpus Christi College at Cambridge University, as well as the University of Stuttgart. He is currently Associate Editor of the Journal of Mechanics and Physics of Solids and of the Journal of Elasticity. He is an ASME Fellow and his honors include the ASME Thomas J.R. Hughes Young Investigator Award (2000), the George H. Heilmeier Faculty Award for Excellence in Research from Penn’s School of Engineering and Applied Science (2007), the Humboldt Senior Research Award (2013) and the ASME Warner T. Koiter Medal (2016).

Host: AME Department

More Info: https://ame.usc.edu/seminars/

Webcast: https://usc.zoom.us/j/96060458816?pwd=8LmoG2q6vBCQubqqWpcizd2F1bxqsH.1

Location: James H. Zumberge Hall Of Science (ZHS) - 252

WebCast Link: https://usc.zoom.us/j/96060458816?pwd=8LmoG2q6vBCQubqqWpcizd2F1bxqsH.1

Audiences: Everyone Is Invited

Contact: Tessa Yao

Event Link: https://ame.usc.edu/seminars/