Water driven deformation in soft solids

Milner, Matthew Paul

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/90969 Copy

Description

Title

Water driven deformation in soft solids

Author(s)

Milner, Matthew Paul

Issue Date

2016-04-28

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Hutchens, Shelby B.

Department of Study

Mechanical Sci & Engineering

Discipline

Mechanical Engineering

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

M.S.

Degree Level

Thesis

Keyword(s)

• creasing
• elastomer

Abstract

Plants have utilized water to achieve many different types of motion, using the concepts that they use, we are able to develop a self-actuated soft solid-liquid composite. This self-actuation is driven by the evaporation and resulting tension of water, which can deform soft materials. The effects that water droplets deforming in soft solids have need to be characterized in order to utilize these composites. When water is embedded in elastomeric materials, it can undergo transitions known as breathing, buckling, and creasing. Breathing and creasing have been observed. These droplets are examined in elastomers of two different elastic modulus. When droplets in the stiffer elastomer crease they form just one crease, whereas less stiff elastomers crease in multiple areas, this is the result of the surface tension. Creasing is expected to set in for any embedded droplet when it shrinks to the same relative size ratio. However, there seems to be a dependence on the stiffness, stiffer samples crease at a smaller size. The pressure in the droplets appears to not reach the expected cavitation limit, which could be a result of not taking strain hardening effects into account in calculations. After studying how a single droplet deforms in an elastomer, multiple droplets are used together in order to achieve motion resulting from evaporation.

Graduation Semester

2016-05

Type of Resource

text

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/90969

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2016 Matthew Milner

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