Nonlocal Elastic Metamaterials: Leveraging Intentional Nonlocality to Design Programmable Structures

该奖项支持旨在开发一种全新的弹性超材料的研究，该超材料利用有意的非定域性作为设计原则，实现通过传统材料无法实现的新材料功能。到目前为止，超材料系统已经能够提供在很大程度上超过传统材料的独特性能，但这些性能限于非常窄的工作频率和功能范围，这反过来又限制了它们的实际应用。非本地化方法将有助于克服将弹性超材料技术转化为现实世界应用的道路上的重大障碍。从更广泛的角度来看，该项目开发的理论和计算设计工具可能会对其他领域和应用产生深远影响，如对极端事件具有弹性的民用基础设施的设计，用于建筑和交通系统噪音控制的隔音，以及用于电子设备、电信和国防系统的先进光子和电磁材料。这一概念取决于一种有意的非局部和分层设计，通过利用跨空间尺度的非局部相互作用，将使材料具有异常宽带的动态性能、可调的有效特性和可编程的动力学。分层设计框架中的非局部性集成导致了多尺度非局部性的概念，该概念将作为基本的理论原则来设计跨尺度的复杂材料行为，并实现对有效材料属性的控制水平，而单尺度操作是无法实现的。该项目还将引入非局部化行动的独特概念，作为实现有效材料调整和重新配置的一种手段。虽然非局部化是非局部性的自然结果，但它在控制材料属性方面的使用在很大程度上是未经探索的，并打开了一个极其灵活和可定制的设计空间，其中材料是以分布式方式设计的，从而为材料显示出极高的结构效率铺平了道路。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award supports research that aims to develop a radically new class of elastic metamaterials that leverages intentional nonlocality as a design principle to achieve new material functionalities unachievable in via traditional materials. To date, metamaterial systems have been able to deliver unique properties that can largely surpass traditional materials, but these properties are limited to very narrow ranges of operating frequencies and functionalities, which in turns limit their practical application. The nonlocal approach will help overcome substantial obstacles on the way to transition elastic metamaterial technology towards real world applications. From a broader perspective, the theoretical and computational design tools developed in this project can have far-reaching impacts in other fields and applications such as the design of civil infrastructures resilient against extreme events, acoustic insulation for noise control in buildings and transportation systems, and advanced photonic and electromagnetic materials for electronic devices, telecommunications, and defense systems. The concept hinges on an intentionally nonlocal and hierarchical design that, by exploiting nonlocal interactions across spatial scales, will enable materials with exceptionally broadband dynamic performance, tunable effective properties, and programmable dynamics. The integration of nonlocality within a hierarchical design framework leads to the concept of multiscale nonlocality that will serve as a foundational theoretical principle to engineer complex material behavior across scales and to achieve a level of control on effective material properties not achievable by operating at a single scale. This project will also introduce the distinctive concept of delocalized action as a means to achieve efficient material tuning and reconfiguration. While delocalization is a natural consequence of nonlocality, its use to control material properties is largely unexplored and opens an extremely flexible and customizable design space where the material is designed in a distributed sense, hence paving the way towards materials exhibiting extreme structural efficiency.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.