bioinspired composite materials

Among all inspiring bio-material, Abalone seashell has its unique characteristics of high strength and toughness. Though , there is the general trend in materials that some of the toughness have been compromised for the sake of increasing hardness and vice versa. This astonishing property of sea shell attracts material scientists to understand the root cause for this property. One of such enthusiast, Prof. Kalpana Katti at North Dakota State University unlocked these secret of these phenomenon lies in its microstructure.

 Biological materials in nature serve as a valuable source of inspiration for developing

 novel synthetic materials with extraordinary properties or functions. Much effort to date

 has been directed toward fabricating and understanding bio-inspired nanocomposites

 with internal architectures mimicking those of nacre and collagen fibril. Here we establish

 simple and explicit analytical solutions for both upper and lower bounds of the elastic

 properties of biocomposites in terms of various physical and geometrical parameters

Deadline for Abstract submission: November 3. See www.mrs.org/spring2009.  A symposium entitled "Structure-Property Relationships in Biomineralized and Biomimetic Composites " will be organized at the MRS-spring meeting in San Francisco next year (April 13-17, 2009).