Thursday September 1, 2022
Time: 3:30 – 4:30pm
This seminar will be held in-person in ASE 1.126
Gabriel Sanoja Lopez, Assistant Professor
Department Research Areas: Advanced Materials, Polymers and Nanotechnology
Molecular Insights into the Mechanical Lifetime of Elastomers
Elastomers are ubiquitous in applications that require large reversible deformations. Although toughness remains an important design consideration to prevent catastrophic failure at high loads, lifetime is often controlled by the progressive growth of an inherent flaw over time. This fracture by mechanical fatigue remains poorly understood due to the inability to visualize and quantify damage by network chain scission and understand fracture mechanisms under a range of loads.
In this seminar, I will discuss how tagging model elastomers with probes that fluoresce upon chain elongation until failure enables mapping and quantification of molecular damage in elastomers. I will consider fracture under two common loads – (i) cyclic loading over numerous cycles of low load (i.e., cyclic fatigue) and (ii) rapid decompression from supersaturated pressures (i.e., cavitation) to outline design rules for fatigue- and cavitation-resistant elastomers based on fracture mechanisms.
For further information, please contact Dr. Stelios Kyriakides at skk@mail.utexas.edu or (512) 471-4167