Principal Investigator: Ricardo Costa
Funder: Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT)
Institution: University of Minho (UMinho)
Call: Individual Call to Scientific Employment Stimulus – 6th Edition (CEEC IND6ed)
Period: 17/09/2024 – 16/09/2030 (6 years)
Reference: 2023.09481.CEECIND
DOI: https://doi.org/10.54499/2023.09481.CEECIND/CP2841/CT0008
Abstract and objectives:
The application of computational mechanics tools in the industry has seen remarkable growth in the past years, fostering technological innovation towards cutting-edge manufacturing processes with complex materials. Moreover, as sustainability has become an essential concern in any economic sector, the reasons for further promoting computer-aided approaches are uncountable. Indeed, the design and optimisation of manufacturing processes are traditionally performed solely through experimentation in time-consuming trial-and-error procedures, with large amounts of material waste and energy consumption. Contrarily, computer-aided approaches promote increased resource-use efficiency (both of material and energy) and foster clean and environmentally sound technologies and industrial processes. On the other side, the development of high-performance, complex materials (such as polymers and composites), with improved mechanical and thermal properties, for critical parts and components (from biomedical to aerospace) demands sophisticated, cutting-edge manufacturing technologies. In polymer processing, the viscoelastic response of molten polymers to deformation, together with the thermal dependence, promotes a counter-intuitive rheological behaviour and makes the experimental-based optimisation of manufacturing processes substantially more challenging. In particular, emerging technologies, such as additive manufacturing, micro-injection moulding, and micro-extrusion, raise considerable difficulties as the elastic effects become more dominant in low mass flows at large deformation rates. Similarly, the complex properties of engineered composite materials, different from the simple individual components, make their structural and thermal performance difficult to predict. The intricate behaviour of these materials and the limitations of the experimental approaches emphasise the benefits of applying computational mechanics tools.
The current so ftware for computational mechanics still relies on classical and simple numerical methods, typically with low accuracy and poor performance, uneven with the ever-increasing complex problems akin to advanced manufacturing technologies with complex materials. Therefore, time- and energy-consuming simulations in powerful hardware are required to achieve reliable results, which substantially constrains the application of computational modelling approaches and their economic viability and sustainability advantages. The present research aims to develop innovative novel numerical methods and computational codes for computational mechanics problems, targeting sophisticated manufacturing technologies with complex materials. Highly accurate discretisation techniques and robust solution procedures, enhanced with optimised algorithms and parallel implementations, will enable highly efficient (time and energy) simulations and provide reliable results, fostering a sustainable technological innovation of industries.