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Fabrics are often used in structural contexts and there are many analytical and computational approaches available. The majority of these approaches homogenize the fabric with bulk continuum properties. Whereas this can often be justified, especially if the fibers/yarns are captured in a matrix material or through coatings, it becomes less reasonable for flexible structures. The goal of this work is to incorporate a solid model for fiber/yarn geometries to study the effect of various parameters (for example friction - both at the yarn-crossover level and also between the various layers involved in a fabric structure) on performance. Another interesting aspect of this work is that the loading will be carried out as ballistic rather than quasi-static loading.
other RESEARCH interests:
Michael Keefe Home Page