A multiscale finite element model has been developed to study the fracture behaviour of two-dimensional random Voronoi structures. The influence of materials parameters and cellular architecture on the damage initiation and accumulation has been analyzed. The effect of the solid material’s strain hardening, relative density and architectural randomness on the ductility and fracture strength of the cellular solid are investigated. The results suggest materials-design directions in which the heat treatment, the solid material properties, its microstructure and the cellular architecture can be tuned for an optimized performance of cellular materials.

Sandwich structures and foamed materials are typical architectured materials. Their combination provides potentially very performant solutions combining stiffness, strength, energy absorption and acoustic damping. The present contribution deals with the integration of a special type of foams, namely hollow spheres stackings, into sandwich structures. Stainless steel hollow spheres main advantage relies on their smooth stress-strain curves and their very good repeatability, compared to other closed cell metallic foams. Therefore these foams are interesting alone but also in sandwich design. A parametric study of the macroscopic behaviour of random stainless steel hollow spheres packing in uniaxial compression was carried out. Scaling laws for the Young's modulus, and for yield strength were established, and they are used to calculate sandwich properties. Then one of the studied metallic hollow spheres packing has been integrated in a sandwich structure with stainless steel faces. Four point bending tests have been performed on various sandwich structures with four core thicknesses and three face thicknesses up to large deflection. We obtained thus the stiffness, the critical load where first damage occurs, the maximum load as a function of the sandwich parameters (core and face thickness). We compared this to classical analytical models.

This study contrasts the implantation of 25 μm thick Polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) membranes with titanium and gold ions at 10 keV and 35 keV for doses from 1×1015 at/cm2 to 2.5×1016 at/cm2 implanted with two different techniques: Filtered Cathodic Vacuum Arc (FCVA) and Low Energy Broad Ion Beam (LEI). The influence of the ion energy, ion type, and implantation tool on the Young’s modulus (E), resistivity and structural properties (nanocluster size and location, surface roughness) of PDMS membranes is reported. At a dose of 2.5×1016 at/cm2 and an energy of 10 keV, which for FCVA yields sheet resistance of less than 200 Ω/square, the initial value of E (0.85 MPa) increases much less for FCVA than for LEI. For gold we obtain E of 5 MPa (FCAV) compared to 86 MPa (LEI) and for titanium 0.94 MPa (FCVA) compared to 57 MPa (LEI). Resistivity measurements show better durability for LEI than for FCVA implanted samples and better time stability for gold than for titanium.

The heat transfer coefficients of porous copper fabricated by the lost carbonate sintering (LCS) process with porosity range from 57% to 82% and pore size from 150 to 1500 μm have been experimentally determined in this study. The sample was attached to the heat plate and assembled into a forced convection system using water as the coolant. The effectiveness of the heat removal from the heat plate through the porous copper-water system was tested under different water flow rates from 0.3 to 2.0 L/min and an input heat flux of 1.3 MW/m2. Porosity has a large effect on the heat transfer performance and the optimum porosity was found to be around 62%. Pore size has a much less effect on the heat transfer performance compared to porosity. High water flow rates enhanced the heat transfer performance for all the samples.

Starting from a bio-based polyol through modification of soybean oil, BIOH™ X-210, two series of bio-based polyurethanes-clay nanocomposite foams have been prepared. The effects of organically-modified clay types and loadings on foam morphology, cell structure, and the mechanical and thermal properties of these bio-based polyurethanes-clay nanocomposite foams have been studied with optical microscopy, compression test, thermal conductivity, DMA and TGA characterization. Density of nanocomposite foams decreases with the increase of clay loadings, while reduced 10% compressive stress and yield stress keep constant up to 2.5% clay loading in polyol. The friability of rigid polyurethane-clay nanocomposite foams is high than that of foam without clay, and the friability for nanofoams from Cloisite® 10A is higher than that from 30B at the same clay loadings. The incorporation of clay nanoplatelets decreases the cell size in nanocomposite foams, meanwhile increases the cell density; which would be helpful in terms of improving thermal insulation properties. All the nanocomposite foams were characterized by increased closed cell content compared with the control foam from X-210 without clay, suggesting the potential to improve thermal insulation of rigid polyurethane foams by utilizing organically modified clay. Incorporation of clay into rigid polyurethane foams results in the increase in glass transition temperature: the Tg increased from 186 to 197 to 204 °C when 30B concentration in X-210 increased from 0 to 0.5 to 2.5%, respectively. Even though the thermal conductivity of nanocomposite foams from 30B is lower than or equal to that of rigid polyurethane control foam from X-210, thermal conductivity of nanocomposite foams from 10A is higher than that of control at all 10A concentrations. The reason for this abnormal phenomenon is not clear at this moment; investigation on this is on progress.

This paper investigates the sound absorption characteristics of porous steel samples manufactured by Lost Carbonate Sintering. Measurements of the normal incidence sound absorption coefficient were made using an impedance tube for single-layer porous steel discs and assemblies comprising four layers of porous steel discs. The sound absorption coefficient was found not to vary significantly with pore size in the range of 250-1500 μm. In general, the absorption coefficient increases with increasing frequency and increasing thickness, and peaks at specific frequencies depending on the porosity. An increase in porosity tends to increase the frequency at which the sound absorption coefficient reaches this peak. An advantage was found in using an assembly of samples with gradient porosities of 75%-70%-65%-60% as it gave higher and more uniform sound absorption coefficients than an assembly with porosities of 75%.

This paper focuses on manufacturing process of regular Metallic Hollow Sphere Structures (MHSS) through brazing technique. As a large stress level is generally confined into the necks formed by brazed spheres, the influence of the filler material on mechanical behavior of cellular metal has been studied. The microstructures of joints resulting from nickel hollow spheres brazing with different commercial fillers “MBF 30” and “MBF 1006” were compared by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and microhardness testing. These studies revealed a wide boron diffusion into nickel shells through grain boundaries for “MBF 30” brazing, with the formation of borides in a fine brittle eutectic structure. Conversely it was observed that the eutectic structure concentrates at the necks for “MBF 1006” and can be completely eliminated by diffusion-brazing, despite of the shells thinness. The uniaxial compressive tests of HSP specimens have shown two different strain mechanisms depending on brazing process.

Introducing a hydrophobic property to vertically aligned hydrophilic metallic nanorods was investigated experimentally and theoretically. First, platinum nanorod arrays were deposited on flat silicon substrates using a sputter Glancing Angle Deposition Technique (GLAD). Then a thin layer of Teflon (nanopatches) was partially deposited on the tips of platinum nanorod at a glancing angle of  = 85° as well as at normal incidence ( = 0°) for different deposition times. We show that GLAD technique is capable of depositing ultrathin isolated Teflon nanopatches on selective regions of nanorod arrays due to the shadowing effect during GLAD. Contact angle measurements on Pt/Teflon nano-composite have shown contact angle values as high as 138°, indicating a significant increase in the hydrophobicity of originally hydrophilic Pt nanostructures. Finally, a 2D simplified wetting model utilizing Cassie and Baxter theory of heterogeneous surfaces has been developed to explain the wetting behavior of Pt/Teflon nanocomposite.

A heat pipe is a device that transports heat against gravity using a wicking material and evaporation-condensation cycle..In these systems a thermal wick moves fluid from the cool region of a heat pipe to the hot region, where evaporative cooling occurs. Due to the operating demands of a thermal wick, several microstructural features are integral to the performance of the wick: capillary radii, specific surface area and permeability. Measuring these properties of a thermal wick (capillary radii, specific surface area and permeability) is difficult, therefore image analysis methods of quantification of the critical properties of a thermal wick has been developed . However, the microstructure of a thermal wick contains semicontinuous pores, therefore connectivity of pores cannot be assumed during quantification of the critical properties.. Two processing parameters, sacrificial template particle size and sintering temperature, were varied during the thermal wick synthesis. Quantification of the critical properties of the thermal wick was performed using the newly developed method. The newly developed method was able to detect the an increase in the pore connectivity as the sintering temperature decreased, and an increase in the connectivity as the sacrificial template particle size decreased. The newly developed method was also able to describe the size distribution of individual pores as well as the hydraulic resistance and orientation of individual pores as well as estimate the porosity and true specific surface area of the different samples.