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For several common electroplated materials: Ni, Cu, Au and Al, which one has strongest fatigue strength? We know the mechanical properties of thin films are different with their bulk counterparts due to the so called "size effect", and material properties depends largely on the microstructure and processing technique. But is there some mateiral laws or guidelines for designers to choose the "best material" as for fatigue resistant? Yield limit? ultimate tensile strength? or elongation? How could one compare material candidates without doing time-consuming test?

There are two very nice companion texts on continuum mechanics and nonlinear elasticity printed by Dover recently: "Continuum mechanics" by Spencer and "An introduction to the theory of elasticity" by Atkin and Fox. Great and fairly affordable reading!

I am planning on using finite difference coding to solve a wave equation. The domain is a rectangular domian with wave reflection on the boundaries. Does anyone know how to set the reflection boundary condition?

Over the last ten years, a peculiar behavior of living cells is revealed: their modulus increases weakly with loading frequency (the so-called weak power law behavior) (for a pure elastic solid, the slope is 0; for a viscous fluid, the slope is 1).  The underlying mechanism is not clear at all; although a phenomenological soft glass rheology model (a model based on a disordered structure system) has been proposed, it cannot explain the multi-power laws at different loading frequencies (see Stamenovic et al, Biophys J Letter, 2007). 

Dielectric elastomers are capable of large deformation subject to an electric voltage, and are promising for uses as actuators, sensors and generators. Because of large deformation, nonlinear equations of state, and diverse modes of failure, modeling the process of electromechanical transduction has been challenging.  This paper studies a membrane of a dielectric elastomer deformed into an out-of-plane, axisymmetric shape, a configuration used in a family of commercial devices known as the Universal Muscle Actuators.