Water driven deformation in soft solids

Plants have utilized water to achieve many different types of motion, using the concepts that they use, we are able to develop a self-actuated soft solid-liquid composite. This self-actuation is driven by the evaporation and resulting tension of water, which can deform soft materials. The effects that water droplets deforming in soft solids have need to be characterized in order to utilize these composites. When water is embedded in elastomeric materials, it can undergo transitions known as breathing, buckling, and creasing. Breathing and creasing have been observed. These droplets are examined in elastomers of two different elastic modulus. When droplets in the stiffer elastomer crease they form just one crease, whereas less stiff elastomers crease in multiple areas, this is the result of the surface tension. Creasing is expected to set in for any embedded droplet when it shrinks to the same relative size ratio. However, there seems to be a dependence on the stiffness, stiffer samples crease at a smaller size. The pressure in the droplets appears to not reach the expected cavitation limit, which could be a result of not taking strain hardening effects into account in calculations. After studying how a single droplet deforms in an elastomer, multiple droplets are used together in order to achieve motion resulting from evaporation.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.S.

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Mechanical Engineering

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2016

Author dc:creator

• Milner, Matthew Paul

Contributors dc:contributor

• Hutchens, Shelby B.

• creasing
• elastomer

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2016 Matthew Milner

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/90969

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/90969