CAREER: Novel Homogenization Approaches to Study the Electromechanical Behavior and Stability of Soft Electrostrictive Composites

该学院早期职业发展（CAREER）计划奖的目的是直接从微观特性和微观结构方面研究软电致伸缩复合材料（SEC）的机电行为和稳定性。SECs是一类新型的电活性材料，具有响应于低强度机械和电刺激而显著且可逆地变形（超过100%）的独特能力。重点将是发展迭代均匀化技术的随机，非线性弹性，介电复合材料进行有限变形和有限电场。尽管考虑到精细的微观细节，这些技术将提供一个易于处理的分析框架-通过各种类型的汉密尔顿-雅可比方程-来描述，解释和预测强耦合和非线性响应的SEC，和他们的机械/电气故障的发作。在技术层面上，这项工作将为自下而上设计SEC产品和设备提供定量基础，这些产品和设备将在医学和能源等重要领域实现许多高端应用，并有可能大大提高我们的生活质量。目前缺乏这样的基础，因此阻碍了这些非凡材料的实际应用，例如，在人造肌肉，能量采集器和药物输送系统中，这些材料被认为是有前途的应用。该项目将包括与阿根廷和法国的机构开展国际合作。它将为研究生和本科生提供培训，并将让高中生参加几项活动，促进他们在接受高等教育之前对科学和工程的兴趣。

The objective of this Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program award is the investigation of the electromechanical behavior and stability of soft electrostrictive composites (SECs), directly in terms of their microscopic properties and microstructures. SECs are a new class of electroactive materials with the unique capability to greatly and reversibly deform (more than 100%) in response to low-intensity mechanical and electrical stimuli. The focus will be on developing iterative homogenization techniques for random, nonlinear elastic, dielectric composites subjected to finite deformations and finite electric fields. In spite of accounting for fine microscopic details, these techniques will provide a tractable analytical framework - via various types of Hamilton-Jacobi equations - to describe, explain, and predict the strongly coupled and nonlinear response of SECs, and the onset of their mechanical/electrical failure. At the technological level, this work will provide a quantitative basis to design, from the bottom up, SEC products and devices that will enable many high-end applications in significant fields such as medicine and energy, with the potential to considerably improve the quality of our lives. The current lack of such a basis has thus far hampered the actual use of these remarkable materials, for instance, in artificial muscles, energy harvesters, and drug delivery systems, which have otherwise been identified as promising applications. This project will include international collaborations with institutions in Argentina and France. It will provide training for graduate and undergraduate students, and will engage high school students in several activities promoting interest in science and engineering prior to higher education.