Characteristics of mechanical metamaterials based on buckling elements
Metamaterials are composed of structural elements and derive their properties mainly from the inner structure of the elements, rather than the properties of their constituent material. By designing an unstable structural element as the building block of a metamaterial, many interesting effective material properties can be obtained. The deformation and dissipation mechanisms of such a material built from unstable structural elements is studied in detail. To do so a combination of analytical, semi-analytical, and numerical models are applied to a single buckling element, a periodic cell, and finite size combinations of buckling elements including gradients in the properties of the building bl…
New Twists of 3D Chiral Metamaterials
Rationally designed artificial materials, called metamaterials, allow for tailoring effective material properties beyond ("meta") the properties of their bulk ingredient materials. This statement is especially true for chiral metamaterials, as unlocking certain degrees of freedom necessarily requires broken centrosymmetry. While the field of chiral electromagnetic/optical metamaterials has become rather mature, the field of elastic/mechanical metamaterials is just emerging and wide open. This research news reviews recent theoretical and experimental progress concerning 3D chiral mechanical and optical metamaterials, with special emphasis on work performed at KIT.