Dear colleagues,
I am pleased to invite you to the next webinar in the Extreme Mechanics Letters (EML) Webinar Series.
Our upcoming seminar will be delivered by Prof. Omar Saleh (UCSB):
"Droplets that stiffen gels"
Date: Friday, 14 August 2026
Time: 10:00 am Boston / 3:00 pm London / 4:00 pm Paris / 10:00 pm Beijing
Discussion leader: Prof. Robert M McMeeking (UCSB)
The 20th edition of the European Mechanics of Materials Conference (EMMC20) will be held in Florence (Italy) on May 27-29, 2026.
Jie Ma, Xizhe Zhang, Daochen Yin, Yijie Cai, Zihang Shen, Zhi Sheng, Jiabao Bai, Shaoxing Qu, Shuze Zhu*, Zheng Jia*, Designing ultratough single-network hydrogels with centimeter-scale fractocohesive lengths via inelastic crack blunting, Advanced Materials, 2311795, 2024
Glad to share that the University of Pavia, together with Politecnico di Milano, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology and University of Bologna, organizes the International Summer School “Mechanics of active soft materials: experiments, theory, numerics, and applications” within the Lake Como School of Advanced Studies, from 1st to 5th July 2024 at Villa del Grumello (Como, Italy). https://star.lakecomoschool.org/
Save the date!
The University of Pavia, together with Politecnico di Milano, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology and University of Bologna, organizes the International Summer School “Mechanics of active soft materials: experiments, theory, numerics, and applications” within the Lake Como School of Advanced Studies.
Organizers: Prof. Giulia Scalet, Prof. Silvia Faré, Prof. Konstantin Volokh, and Prof. Fabiana Zama.
Zhi Sheng, Jie Ma, Zihang Shen, Shaoxing Qu, and Zheng Jia*, Chemomechanics Underpinning the Growth and Strengthening Behaviors of Mechanoresponsive Self-Growing Hydrogels, Macromolecules (2023)
Yijie Cai, Jie Ma, Zihang Shen, Xianmin Shao, Zheng Jia *, Shaoxing Qu, Enhancing the fracture resistance of hydrogels by regulating the energy release rate via bilayer designs: Theory and experiments, Journal of the Mechanics and Physics of Solids, 170, 105125 (2023)
Jie Ma, Daochen Yin, Zhi Sheng, Jian Cheng, Zheng Jia*, Teng Li, Shaoxing Qu, Delayed Tensile Instabilities of Hydrogels, Journal of the Mechanics and Physics of Solids, 168, 105052 (2022)
A postdoctoral position will be available at University of Pavia in Italy starting January 2023. The position will be part of an ERC Starting project. Interested candidates are encouraged to contact Dr Giulia Scalet (giulia.scalet [at] unipv.it).
The submersion of a polymer network with a high density of hydrogen bond based cross-links in an aqueous bath results in the formation of a rubber-like hydrogel. The cross-links, which connect chains and maintain the structure of the network, can dissociate as a result of two main factors: (1) the interactions between the hydrogen bonds and the surrounding water molecules and (2) the forces that are exerted on the cross-link from the interconnected chains.
