Jian ZHU's blog

Two postdoctoral positions are
available in the area of applied mechanics/mechanical design at the National
University of Singapore, Singapore.  Experiment
experience is a plus. One may focus on energy harvesting using soft active
materials, while the other may focus on soft robots.

A combination of experiment and theory shows that dielectric elastomers exhibit complex interplay of nonlinear processes. Membranes of a dielectric elastomer are prepared in various states of prestretches by using rigid clamps and mechanical forces.

This paper studies the dynamic behavior of a dielectric elastomer balloon subject to a combination of pressure and voltage.  When the pressure and voltage are static, the balloon may reach a state of equilibrium.  We determine the stability of the state of equilibrium, and calculate the natural frequency of the small-amplitude oscillation around the state of equilibrium.  When the voltage is sinusoidal, the balloon resonates at multiple frequencies of excitation, giving rise to superharmonic, harmonic, and subharmonic responses.  Whe