POLITECNICO DI TORINO - DOCTORATE SCHOOL RESEARCH PROFILES FOR DOCTORAL STUDENTS DOCTORAL COURSE IN STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING RESEARCH TOPICS Super-strong bio-inspired hierarchical nanomaterials Hierarchical nanostructured materials represent the future in material science, as suggested by biological materials They exhibit several levels of hierarchy, from the nano- to the macro-scale Sea shells have or orders of lamellar structures, as well as bone and dentin, have orders of hierarchy The mechanical properties of hierarchical bio- or bio-inspired nanomaterials, such as nanotube/super-nanotube reinforced composites or bundles, will be investigated Optimization procedures will be proposed to design highstrength and simultaneously high-toughness new nanomaterials, taking into account the toughening hierarchical mechanisms; this is the critical point in the material optimization, as observed in the existing strong but relatively brittle nanocomposites Eventually, the analytical results will be compared with nanoscale (e.g nanoindentation) experiments If efficient optimization procedures for super-strong nanomaterials will be achieved, the impact on the scientific community and industrial technology will be relevant Other related topic: Super-adhesive bio-inspired hierarchical nanosurfaces REFERENCE PROFESSOR(S) Nicola Pugno http://staff.polito.it/nicola.pugno/ INTERNATIONAL AND INDUSTRIAL COOPERATION International Cooperation: see “Contacts” Industrial Cooperation: SORIN, on smart materials and structures, for biomedical applications RESEARCH GROUP Nicola Pugno (within the group of Prof Carpinteri) REFERENCE PAPERS List of related papers is reported at http://staff.polito.it/nicola.pugno/, examples are: A Carpinteri, N Pugno, Are the scaling laws on strength of solids related to mechanics or to geometry? NATURE MATERIALS, June (2005), 4, 421-423 N Pugno, Velcro® nonlinear mechanics APPLIED PHYSICS LETTERS (2007), 90, 121918 N Pugno, Towards a Spiderman suit: large invisible cables and self-cleaning releasable super-adhesive materials J OF PHYSICS – COND MAT (2007), 19, 395001 (17pp) N Pugno, Mimicking nacre with super-nanotubes for producing optimized super-composites NANOTECHNOLOGY (2006), 17, 5480-5484 N Pugno, A Carpinteri, Nanomechanics of hierarchical biomaterials THE NANOMECHANICS IN ITALY, Editor Nicola M Pugno, RESEARCH SIGNPOST (2007) 11-21 A Carpinteri, N Pugno, Strength and toughness of micro- and nano-structured materials: unified influence of composition, grain size and structural dimension REVIEW ON ADVANCED MATERIAL SCIENCE J., (2005), 10, 320-324 N Pugno The role of defects in the design of the space elevator cable: from nanotube to megatube ACTA MATERIALIA (2007), 55, 5269-5279 CONTACTS Strong collaborations are expected (since already well-established) inside our university (e.g with the Departments of Mechanical Engineering, Physics, Chemistry and Material Science), or outside with different Institutions, national: e.g Istituto Nazionale di Ricerca Metrologica (I.N.RI.M.), Torino; National Research Center on nanoStructures and bioSystems at Surfaces (S3), Modena; Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare – Laboratori Nazionali di Frascati, Frascati; and international: e.g Northwestern University, IL; The University of Texas at Austin, TX; University of Thessaloniki, Greece; Florida State University; among others ...Editor Nicola M Pugno, RESEARCH SIGNPOST (2007) 1 1-2 1 A Carpinteri, N Pugno, Strength and toughness of micro- and nano-structured materials: unified influence of composition, grain size and structural. .. MATERIALIA (2007), 55, 526 9-5 279 CONTACTS Strong collaborations are expected (since already well-established) inside our university (e.g with the Departments of Mechanical Engineering, Physics, Chemistry... Chemistry and Material Science), or outside with different Institutions, national: e.g Istituto Nazionale di Ricerca Metrologica (I.N.RI.M.), Torino; National Research Center on nanoStructures and bioSystems