Contact phenomena among deformable bodies abound in industry and everyday life, and play an important role in structural and mechanical systems. The complicated surface structure, physics and chemistry involved in contact processes make it necessary to model them with highly complex and nonlinear initial-boundary value problems. Indeed, the now famous Signorini problem was formulated as an idea...

Many insects with smooth adhesive pads can rapidly enlarge their contact area by centripetal pulls on the legs, allowing them to cope with sudden mechanical perturbations such as gusts of wind or raindrops. The short time scale of this reaction excludes any neuromuscular control; it is thus more likely to be caused by mechanical properties of the pad's specialized cuticle. This soft cuticle con...

Effective elastic properties for carbon nanotube reinforced composites are obtained through a variety of micromechanics techniques. An embedded carbon nanotube  in  a  polymer  matrix  and  its surrounding  interphase  is  replaced with an equivalent fiber for  predicting  the  mechanical  properties of  the  carbon  nanotube/polymer composite. The effects of an interphase layer between the nan...

The article proposes a constructive technical solution to increase the contact adaptivity of mechanical roof support. developed mechanized support section is able adapt changing mining and geological conditions in process excavation pillar, which increases efficiency safety coal longwall.

For soft materials with Young’s moduli below 100 kPa, quantifying mechanical and interfacial properties by small scale indentation is challenging because in addition to adhesion and elasticity, surface tension plays a critical role. Until now, microscale contact of very soft materials has only been studied by static experiments under zero external loading. Here we introduce a combination of the...