Virtual Experiments and Design of Particulate Composites with the Inclusion-based Boundary Element Method (iBEM)

This project is to establish a new computational approach to the design and manufacture of particulate composites. The performance of a composite changes with many factors, so developing a new composite commonly requires a large number of experiments to optimize the manufacture parameters if a parametric experimental approach is adopted. Through accurately reproducing the complex material processing and testing by virtual experiments, physical experiments can be reliably simulated on the computer, and thus significantly reduce both the material development time and cost. Application of the inclusion-based boundary element method (iBEM) is planned to create high fidelity simulation of the material behavior and will be used for the virtual experiments of the particulate composites. While the principles and methodologies developed can be applied to general composites, this project focuses on lightweight concrete (LWC), which is made of foam particles mixed in a cement paste. Its unique thermal, acoustic and lightweight properties make it an excellent material for energy efficient building envelope. This project will produce a new tool to accelerate the design and development cycle of advanced materials, which will produce significant benefits to our manufacturing industry and thus to the U.S. economy. The multidisciplinary research covering theoretical, numerical and experimental aspects will promote our student research and education in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).

This project integrates computation, experiments, and micromechanics together to establish a new design paradigm that advances the state-of-the-art of the design of particulate composites in the following aspects: 1) The random particulate microstructure generation algorithm will provide a practical method to construct digital composite materials; 2) The iBEM, simulating each inhomogeneity as an inclusion with an eigenstrain through the Green function technique, will avoid meshing inside the representative volume element (RVE), enable the simulation of >1000 inhomogeneities, and therefore provide a more objective, realistic description of material samples; 3) Interactions of inhomogeneities across two length scales (micron and millimeter) will be evaluated to predict the failure process through the microstructural evolution of the composite, and; 4) The virtual experiments, validated by a few actual experiments, will reproduce the mechanical behavior on computer and accelerate material design and the optimization process of new composite materials. The success of this project will not only establish our LWC design method, but also lead to a breakthrough in computer-aided design (CAD) of particulate composites. In addition, it will demonstrate the iBEM as a new continuum method to study particle interactions of many-particle systems.

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.