Nonlocal Elastic Metamaterials: Leveraging Intentional Nonlocality to Design Programmable Structures

该奖项支持旨在开发一种全新类型的弹性超材料的研究，该材料利用有意的非局域性作为设计原则，以实现传统材料无法实现的新材料功能。迄今为止，超材料系统已经能够提供大大超越传统材料的独特性能，但这些性能仅限于非常狭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。非局域方法将有助于克服弹性超材料技术向现实世界应用过渡的重大障碍。 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以对其他领域和应用产生深远的影响，例如抵御极端事件的民用基础设施的设计、建筑物和交通系统中噪声控制的隔音材料，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。该概念取决于有意的非局域和分层设计，通过利用跨空间尺度的非局域相互作用，将使材料具有异常宽带动态性能、可调有效属性和可编程动力学。将非定域性集成到分层设计框架中产生了多尺度非定域性的概念，它将作为跨尺度设计复杂材料行为的基本理论原则，并实现对有效材料属性的控制水平，这是在单一尺度下操作无法实现的。该项目还将引入离域作用的独特概念，作为实现高效材料调整和重新配置的手段。虽然离域性是非定域性的自然结果，但它在控制材料属性方面的用途在很大程度上尚未被探索，并且打开了一个极其灵活和可定制的设计空间，其中材料以分布式方式设计，从而为材料表现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价值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.