SBIR Phase I: Development and optimization of a novel lightweight and impact-resistant composite

这项小企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目具有更广泛的影响/商业潜力，是一种独特的连续纤维复合材料，重量轻，与市售碳纤维复合材料相比，具有更强的抗冲击性和吸能性。由于航空航天和汽车应用以及国防和清洁能源应用的快速增长，预计美国和世界范围内对先进复合材料的需求将稳步增长。传统和常用的由碳纤维或玻璃纤维组成的纤维增强复合材料虽然具有高强度重量比和轻质性能，但往往具有脆性和低抗冲击性。缺乏损伤容限会导致各种形式的局部和非局部材料失效，损害材料的结构完整性，并产生更换成本和废料浪费。为了在各种应用中更广泛地采用这些材料，开发能够承受冲击场景并具有损伤容限的复合材料是必要的。这个小企业创新研究（SBIR）第一阶段项目将探索材料开发和加工方法，以进步和优化所提出的新型复合材料的性能。该项目将评估由这种材料技术的不同迭代组成的配方的可行性，同时评估预处理和后处理技术的性能和可扩展性。此外，还将探索诸如增强纤维-基体结合以增强抗裂纹扩展和能量分布等改进策略。这将与测试方法相结合，展示各种材料属性分类，以及特定应用的概念验证测试，以展示性能有效性。目标是接近高性能金属合金的各向同性和抗冲击性，同时保持碳纤维复合材料的轻量化、高强度比重量性能。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is a unique continuous-fiber composite that is lightweight and offers enhanced impact resistance and energy absorbance compared to commercially available carbon fiber composites. The demand for advanced composite materials is expected to steadily increase both in the United States and worldwide due to rapid growth in aerospace and automotive applications, as well as defense and clean energy applications. Though valued for their high strength-to-weight and lightweight properties, traditional and commonly-utilized fiber-reinforced composites composed of carbon fiber or fiberglass tend to exhibit brittle properties and low impact tolerance. Lack of damage tolerance leads to various forms of localized and nonlocalized material failure, compromising the material's structural integrity and incurring replacement costs and scrap waste. Developing composite materials that can withstand impact scenarios and possess damage tolerance is necessary to enable more widespread adoption of these materials across a variety of applications.This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will explore material development and processing methodologies to progress and optimize the performance of the proposed novel composite material. The project will evaluate the feasibility of formulations composed of different iterations of this material technology while evaluating pre- and post-processing techniques for performance and scalability. Additional refinement strategies such as enhancing the fiber-matrix bond for enhanced anti-crack propagation and energy distribution will also be explored. This will be coupled with testing methodologies demonstrating various material property classifications as well as application-specific, proof-of-concept testing to demonstrate performance effectiveness. The goal is to approach the isotropic properties and impact resistance of high-performance metal alloys while retaining the lightweight, high strength-to-weight performance of carbon fiber composites.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.