Enhanced Deformability Through Distributed Buckling in Stiff Quasicrystalline Architected Materials.

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Mechanical Engineering
• Metamaterials

Background:

• Architected materials leverage microstructures for unique mechanical properties and material efficiency.
• Low-density materials face challenges in balancing stiffness with large-strain deformability.
• Existing periodic microstructures often exhibit instabilities like buckling and brittle collapse.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce a novel class of aperiodic architected materials inspired by quasicrystalline lattices.
• To address the limitations of periodic designs in achieving both high stiffness and stable large-strain deformability.
• To explore the potential of quasicrystal-inspired structures for advanced metamaterial applications.

Main Methods:

• Deriving beam networks from canonical quasicrystalline patterns (2D Penrose tiling, 3D icosahedral quasicrystals).
• Utilizing numerical simulations and experimental validation to analyze mechanical properties.
• Investigating force chain distributions and instability mitigation mechanisms.

Main Results:

• Quasicrystal-inspired designs exhibit stiff, stretching-dominated topologies.
• Non-uniform force chains effectively mitigate global instabilities seen in periodic designs.
• Localized buckling instabilities are distributed, enhancing overall material stability.
• Designs demonstrate combined stiffness and stable large-strain deformability.

Conclusions:

• Aperiodic architected materials based on quasicrystalline lattices represent a significant advancement in metamaterial design.
• These materials effectively combine high stiffness with stable large-strain deformability, outperforming traditional periodic designs.
• The findings highlight the potential of deterministic quasi-periodic topologies for applications requiring high impact resistance and energy absorption.