Many electroactive functional materials have been used in smalland microscale transducers and precision mechatronic control systems for years. It was not until the mid-1980s that scientists started integrating electroactive materials with large-scale structures as in situ sensors and/or actuators, thus introducing the concept of smart materials, smart structures, and structronic systems. This p...

Smart sensors densely distributed over structures can use their computational and wireless communication capabilities to provide rich information for structural health monitoring (SHM). Though smart sensor technology has seen substantial advances during recent years, implementation of smart sensors on full-scale structures has been limited. While users often postulate that wired sensing systems...

The previous two projects jointly conducted by the same team, AVT/T-121 Application of Smart Materials in the Vibration Control of Aeronautical Structures (April 2000March 2002) and AVT/T-129 Development of Control Strategies for the Vibration Control of Smart Aeronautical Structures (April 2002March 2004), form the basis of this project. During these, first the smart beam-like structures were ...

Photonic sensors, signal processors and communication technologies have emerged as viable alternatives to electronics. Fiber optic sensors which can readily be integrated with smart materials and structures offer an immense potential in the realization of intelligent systems. This paper presents an overview of different types of fiber optic sensors and their application to smart structures.

The dynamic stability of a composite plate with external electrorheological (ER) damper subjected to an axial periodic load is investigated. Electrorheological fluids are a class of smart materials, which exhibit reversible changes in mechanical properties when subjected to an electric field. As a result, the dynamic behavior of the structure is changed. The ER damper is used for suppressing th...