Ratcheting in structural adhesives

Durability of structural adhesives in bridges Master Project DURABILITY OF STRUCTURAL ADHESIVES IN BRIDGES

Ratcheting fluid with geometric anisotropy

We investigate a mechanism that effectively transports fluids using vibrational motion imposed onto fluid boundary with anisotropy. In our experiment, two asymmetric, sawtooth-like structures are placed facing each other and form a corrugated fluid channel. This channel is then forced to open and close periodically. Under reciprocal motion, fluid fills in the gap during the expansion phase of t...

Ratcheting of granular materials.

We investigate the quasistatic mechanical response of soils under cyclic loading using a discrete model of randomly generated convex polygons. This response exhibits a sequence of regimes, each one characterized by a linear accumulation of plastic deformation with the number of cycles. At the grain level, a quasiperiodic ratchetlike behavior is observed at the contacts, which excludes the exist...

Stabilizing multicellularity through ratcheting

The evolutionary transition to multicellularity probably began with the formation of simple undifferentiated cellular groups. Such groups evolve readily in diverse lineages of extant unicellular taxa, suggesting that there are few genetic barriers to this first key step. This may act as a double-edged sword: labile transitions between unicellular and multicellular states may facilitate the evol...

Structural and tribometric characterization of biomimetically inspired synthetic "insect adhesives"

Background: Based on previous chemical analyses of insect tarsal adhesives, we prepared 12 heterogeneous synthetic emulsions mimicking the polar/non-polar principle, analysed their microscopical structure and tested their adhesive, frictional, and rheological properties. Results: The prepared emulsions varied in their consistency from solid rubber-like, over soft elastic, to fluid (watery or oi...