V. K. Srivastava¹, A. Pizzi^2,3,*

Journal of Renewable Materials, Vol.2, No.3, pp. 201-206, 2014, DOI:10.7569/JRM.2014.634107

Abstract Fine wood powder/furanic foams were prepared with a strong predominance of the wood component. Low weight and density are important properties of foamed composites. Focusing on preparing light materials, wood foam composites were made using a chemical foaming method and expanded using diethyl ether as the foaming agent. The additives were added to note their effect on the density and mechanical properties, like impact strength and Young’s moduli, of the expanded composites. Various tests and scanning electron microscopy analysis were also performed. The foaming agent resulted in closed cells with varied sizes and more or More >

L.B. Borkowski¹, K.C. Liu¹, A. Chattopadhyay¹

CMC-Computers, Materials & Continua, Vol.37, No.3, pp. 161-193, 2013, DOI:10.3970/cmc.2013.037.161

Abstract The microstructural variation in fiber-reinforced composites has a direct relationship with its local and global mechanical performance. When micromechanical modeling techniques for unidirectional composites assume a uniform and periodic arrangement of fibers, the bounds and validity of this assumption must be quantified. The goal of this research is to quantify the influence of microstructural randomness on effective homogeneous response and local inelastic behavior. The results indicate that microstructural progression from ordered to disordered decreases the tensile modulus by 5%, increases the shear modulus by 10%, and substantially increases the magnitude of local inelastic fields. The More >

C.J. Huang¹, T.Y. Hung¹, K.N. Chiang²

CMC-Computers, Materials & Continua, Vol.36, No.2, pp. 99-133, 2013, DOI:10.3970/cmc.2013.036.099

Abstract The development in the field of nanotechnology has prompted numerous researchers to develop various simulation methods for determining the material properties of nanoscale structures. However, these methods are restricted by the speed limitation of the central processing unit (CPU), which cannot estimate larger-scale nanoscale models within an acceptable time. Thus, decreasing the CPU processing time and retaining the estimation accuracy of physical properties of nanoscale structures have become critical issues. Accordingly, this study aims to decrease the CPU processing time and complexity of large nanoscale models by utilizing, atomistic-continuum mechanics (ACM) to build an equivalent… More >

Hsien-Chie Cheng¹, Yu-Chen Hsu², Wen-Hwa Chen²

CMC-Computers, Materials & Continua, Vol.11, No.2, pp. 127-146, 2009, DOI:10.3970/cmc.2009.011.127

Abstract Due to the limitation of fabrication technologies nowadays, structural or atomistic defects are often perceived in carbon nanotubes (CNTs) during the manufacturing process. The main goal of the study aims at providing a systematic investigation of the effects of atomistic defects on the nanomechanical properties and fracture behaviors of single-walled CNTs (SWCNTs) using molecular dynamics (MD) simulation. Furthermore, the correlation between local stress distribution and fracture evolution is studied. Key parameters and factors under investigation include the number, type (namely the vacancy and Stone-Wales defects), location and distribution of defects. Results show that the nanomechanical More >