title: Compliance of a microfibril subjected to shear and normal loads.
abstract: Many synthetic bio-inspired adhesives consist of an array of microfibrils attached to an elastic backing layer, resulting in a tough and compliant structure. The surface region is usually subjected to large and nonlinear deformations during contact with an indenter, leading to a strongly nonlinear response. In order to understand the compliance of the fibrillar regions, we examine the nonlinear deformation of a single fibril subjected to a combination of shear and normal loads. An exact closed-form solution is obtained using elliptic functions. The prediction of our model compares well with the results of an indentation experiment.
authors.affiliation: Department of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Jingzhou
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Chung-Yuen
authors.initials: CY
authors.lastname: Hui
authors.forename: Lulin
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Shen
authors.forename: Anand
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Jagota
mesh_terms: D004548:Elasticity; D020894:Microfibrils / Q000737:chemistry*; D008956:Models, Chemical; D033081:Shear Strength; D013314:Stress, Mechanical