Synthetic materials usually suffer from a trade-off between stiffness and toughness. Many biological materials, on the other hand, show a unique blend of high strength and ductility. The combination of complex hierarchical geometry, material nonlinear response and special structural features provides mechanisms to resist fracture at multiple length scales leading to remarkable values of fracture toughness. This mini symposium welcomes contributions in the broader range of computational modeling and experimental characterization of multiscale toughness mechanisms in biomineralized tissues. Topics include but not limited to: 1) Physics of adhesion in biological tissues at microscale, 2) Multiscale modeling of crack propagation in biological materials, 3) experimental measurements of fracture properties at microscales, and 4) topology optimization of bio-mimetic materials.

Schedule

Crack propagation in bone on the scale of mineralized collagen fibrils: role of polymers with sacrificial bonds and hidden length

Ahmed Elbanna, UIUC, United States
Wenyi Wang, UIUC, United States

Potential within: topology optimization of the spine

Ahmed Elbanna, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign United States
Darin Peetz, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign United States