156 research outputs found
Clean by Nature. Lively Surfaces and the Holistic-Systemic Heritage of Contemporary Bionik.
This paper addresses questions regarding the prospering field of Bionik in Germany. Its starting point is the wide spread assumption that universal functional principles exist in nature and that these ‘solutions’ can be transferred into technological objects. Accordingly, advocates of Bionik herald the advent of a better world with more sustainable and efficient products of engineering. The so-called ‘functional surfaces’ occupy a special place within this contemporary version of biomimesis. Shark-skin-inspired swim suits, self-cleaning façade paints with lotus effect or drag reducing Dolphin-Skins for aircraft-wings are expected to improve the quality of life for everyone. It seems that skin and shell of living systems return as revenants to our technological world and live their afterlives as lively surfaces of everyday objects.
This paper argues however, that understanding this attention to ‘natural engineering solutions’ in contemporary Bionik, one needs to focus on a different kind of afterlife. For baring the historic-epistemological roots allows fathoming direct connections to two widely influential historical concepts within the history of science in the 20th century: Biotechnik, a very popular bio-philosophical concept from the Weimar Republic of the 1920s and Bionics, an in many ways similar endeavor that emerged during the second wave of Cybernetics in the USA from around 1960. Both historical concepts share a certain proximity to a distinct holistic-systemic style of thinking that emerged during the 20th century and still resonates with the movement of Bionik in contemporary Germany.
Based on the example of the lotus effect, I want to address three aspects of the afterlife of this holistic-systemic heritage in contemporary Bionik. First, the assumption that the best engineering solutions can be found in nature conceals the specific discursive and non-discursive complexity that forms the basis of all technological objects. Second, the holistic-systemic heritage of Bionik directly correlates with its epistemological bias towards visual evidence and its enthusiasm for ‘functional surfaces’. Third, the rhetoric of Bionik paradoxically oscillates between a counter-modern demotion of human creativity and autonomy and a fascination for modern scientific instruments and practices
Advanced oxygen-hydrocarbon rocket engine study
Preliminary identification and evaluation of promising LO2/Hydrocarbon rocket engine cycles were used to produce a consistent and reliable data base for vehicle optimization and design studies. cycles G and C were chosen for design analysis. Preliminary design analysis of the heat transfer subsystem was performed to establish major technology requirements
The Behavior of Granular Materials under Cyclic Shear
The design and development of a parallel plate shear cell for the study of
large scale shear flows in granular materials is presented. The parallel plate
geometry allows for shear studies without the effects of curvature found in the
more common Couette experiments. A system of independently movable slats
creates a well with side walls that deform in response to the motions of grains
within the pack. This allows for true parallel plate shear with minimal
interference from the containing geometry. The motions of the side walls also
allow for a direct measurement of the velocity profile across the granular
pack. Results are presented for applying this system to the study of transients
in granular shear and for shear-induced crystallization. Initial shear profiles
are found to vary from packing to packing, ranging from a linear profile across
the entire system to an exponential decay with a width of approximately 6 bead
diameters. As the system is sheared, the velocity profile becomes much sharper,
resembling an exponential decay with a width of roughly 3 bead diameters.
Further shearing produces velocity profiles which can no longer be fit to an
exponential decay, but are better represented as a Gaussian decay or error
function profile. Cyclic shear is found to produce large scale ordering of the
granular pack, which has a profound impact on the shear profile. There exist
periods of time in which there is slipping between layers as well as periods of
time in which the layered particles lock together resulting in very little
relative motion.Comment: 10 pages including 12 figure
Stress response function of a two-dimensional ordered packing of frictional beads
We study the stress profile of an ordered two-dimensional packing of beads in
response to the application of a vertical overload localized at its top
surface. Disorder is introduced through the Coulombic friction between the
grains which gives some indeterminacy and allows the choice of one constrained
random number per grain in the calculation of the contact forces. The so-called
`multi-agent' technique we use, lets us deal with systems as large as
grains. We show that the average response profile has a double
peaked structure. At large depth , the position of these peaks grows with
, while their widths scales like . and are analogous to
`propagation' and `diffusion' coefficients. Their values depend on that of the
friction coefficient . At small , we get and , with , which means that the peaks get
closer and wider as the disorder gets larger. This behavior is qualitatively
what was predicted in a model where a stochastic relation between the stress
components is assumed.Comment: 7 pages, 7 figures, accepted version to Europhys. Let
Numerical Study of the Stress Response of Two-Dimensional Dense Granular Packings
We investigate the Green function of two-dimensional dense random packings of
grains in order to discriminate between the different theories of stress
transmission in granular materials. Our computer simulations allow for a
detailed quantitative investigation of the dynamics which is difficult to
obtain experimentally. We show that both hyperbolic and parabolic models of
stress transmission fail to predict the correct stress distribution in the
studied region of the parameters space. We demonstrate that the compressional
and shear components of the stress compare very well with the predictions of
isotropic elasticity for a wide range of pressures and porosities and for both
frictional and frictionless packings. However, the states used in this study do
not include the critical isostatic point for frictional particles, so that our
results do not preclude the fact that corrections to elasticity may appear at
the critical point of jamming, or for other sample preparation protocols, as
discussed in the main text. We show that the agreement holds in the bulk of the
packings as well as at the boundaries and we validate the linear dependence of
the stress profile width with depth.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figure
Particle self-assembly on soft elastic shells
We use numerical simulations to show how noninteracting hard particles
binding to a deformable elastic shell may self-assemble into a variety of
linear patterns. This is a result of the nontrivial elastic response to
deformations of shells. The morphology of the patterns can be controlled by the
mechanical properties of the surface, and can be fine-tuned by varying the
binding energy of the particles. We also repeat our calculations for a fully
flexible chain and find that the chain conformations follow patterns similar to
those formed by the nanoparticles under analogous conditions. We propose a
simple way of understanding and sorting the different structures and relate it
to the underlying shape transition of the shell. Finally, we discuss the
implications of our results
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