Micromechanics of Electro- and Magneto-active Soft Composites

We study the coupled behavior in soft active microstructured materials undergoing large deformations in the presence of an external electric or magnetic field. We focus on the role of the microstructures on the coupled behavior, and examine the phenomenon in the composites with (a) periodic composites with rectangular and hexagonal periodic unit cells, and (b) in composites with the random distributions of active particles embedded in a soft matrix. We show that for these similar microstructures exhibit very different responses in terms of the actuation, and the coupling phenomenon. Next, we consider the macroscopic and microscopic instabilities in the active composites. We show that the external field has a significant influence of the instability phenomena, and can stabilize or destabilize the composites depending on the direction relative to composite geometry. (© 2016 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)