The first Nanomaterials webinar, entitled “Advanced Mechanical Modeling of Nanomaterials and Nanostructures”, was held on Friday 16 October 2020, and chaired by Dr. Francesco Tornabene.

In recent decades, composite materials have been increasingly applied in many industries and used in many structural applications, due to their higher values of strength and stiffness, superior thermal properties, and lower levels of weights. The discovery of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) or further nano-scale derivatives of carbon, such as graphene, with their oxide, opens a new horizon in material science, and makes these advanced nano-scale materials an efficient alternative to conventional micro-size reinforcements such as carbon and glass fibers. The use of carbon-based nanofillers as a reinforcement phase in polymers enables enhanced properties within nanocomposites, namely, high stiffness, strength, toughness, hardness, heat distortion temperature, and electrical properties; in addition to a reduced processing cost due to their exclusive nanostructures.

In a context where increased computational demand is required to solve such solid mechanics problems, the webinar focused on the application of high-performing computational strategies and advanced theoretical formulations to solve similar complicated problems (i.e., static, dynamic problems, including possible thermal effects), while presenting comparatively the numerical results from several systematic investigations, useful for many engineering applications.

After an introduction from the chair, Prof. Dr. Rossana Dimitri presented her research on “High-performing numerical methods for the mechanical study of nanocomposite materials and structures”. Prof. Salvatore Brischetto followed with his presentation on “3D and advanced shell models for the analysis of single- and double-walled carbon nanotubes and nano-reinforced structures”.

The details of experts:

Dr. Francesco Tornabene is a researcher at the School of Engineering, Department of Innovation Engineering, University of Salento. He was born on 13 January 1978 in Bologna, where he received the high school degree at Liceo Classico San Luigi, in 1997. In 2001 he achieved a National Patent Bologna (Italy) for the Industrial Invention: Friction Clutch for High Performance Vehicles Question BO2001A00442. He received from the University of Bologna - Alma Mater Studiorum, a M.Sc. degree in Mechanical Engineering (Curriculum in Structural Mechanics), on 23/07/2003, discussing a thesis entitled: “Dynamic Behavior of Cylindrical Shells: Formulation and Solution”. In December 2003, he was admitted at the PhD course in Structural Mechanics, at the University of Bologna, reaching the first position in the competitive admission. In 2004, he received from the University of Bologna a Thesis price in memory of Carlo Felice Jodi; in 2007 he received the Ph.D. degree in Structural Mechanics at the University of Bologna, discussing the Thesis entitled “Modeling and Solution of Shell Structures Made of Anisotropic Materials”. From 2007 to 2009 he received a research fellowship by the University of Bologna, working on the “Unified Formulation of Shell Structures Made of Anisotropic Materials. Numerical Analysis Using the Generalized Differential Quadrature Method and the Finite Element Method”. From 2011 to 2012 he became a Junior researcher within the research program entitled “Advanced Numerical Schemes for Anisotropic Materials”; from 2012 to 2018 he was an Assistant Professor and Lecturer at the Alma Mater Studiorum - University of Bologna; from 2018 up to date he is an Assistant Professor in Structural Mechanics and Lecturer at the University of Salento, Department of Innovation Engineering (Lecce). For a long time his scientific interests include the Structural Mechanics, Solid Mechanics, Innovative and Smart Materials, Computational Mechanics and Numerical Techniques, Damage and Fracture Mechanics. He is author of more than 260 scientific publications, and collaborates with many national or international researchers and professors all over the world, as visible from his scientific production. He is author of 11 books, see e.g. “Meccanica delle Strutture a Guscio in Materiale Composito. Il metodo Generalizzato di Quadratura Differenziale” (2012); “Mechanics of Laminated Composite Doubly-Curved Shell Structures. The Generalized Differential Quadrature Method and the Strong Formulation Finite Element Method” (2014); “Laminated Composite Doubly-Curved Shell Structures I. Differential Geometry. Higher-Order Structural Theories” (2016); “Laminated Composite Doubly-Curved Shell Structures II. Differential and Integral Quadrature. Strong Formulation Finite Element Method” (2016), among many. He is member of the Editorial Board for 38 International Journals (see, e.g. Journal of Engineering, International Journal of Engineering & Applied Sciences, Composite Structures, Technologies, Journal of Applied and Computational Mechanics, Journal of Composites Science, Advanced Materials and Technologies, Heliyon, International Scholarly Research Notices, Mathematical Problems in Engineering, ISRN Mechanical Engineering, Journal of Computational Engineering, Advances in Aircraft and Spacecraft Science). He is also Editor-in-Chief for 2 International Journals: Curved and Layered Structures, Journal of Composites Science; from 2019 he is Associate Editor for the International Journal “Mechanics Based Design of Structures and Machines”. In the last years he received different important awards, see e.g. “Highly Cited Researcher by Clarivate Analytics” (years 2018, 2019), “Ambassador of Bologna Award for the organization of 21st International Conference on Composite Structures ICCS21, 4-7 September 2018, Bologna, Italy” (2019), “Member of the European Academy of Sciences” (since 2018). He collaborates as reviewer with more than 200 prestigious international journals in the structural mechanics field. From 2012, his teaching activity includes Dynamics of Structures; Computational Mechanics; Plates and Shells; Theory of Structures, Structural Mechanics. He is habilitated as Associate Professor and Full Professor in the area 08/B2 (Structural Mechanics) and as Associate Professor in Area 09/A1 (Aeronautical and Aerospace Engineering and Naval Architecture).

Prof. Dr. Rossana Dimitri is an Associate Professor at the School of Engineering, Department of Innovation Engineering, University of Salento, Lecce, Italy. She received from the University of Salento, a M. Sc. degree in “Materials Engineering” in 2004, a Ph.D. degree in “Materials and Structural Engineering” in 2009, and a Ph.D. degree in “Industrial and Mechanical Engineering” in 2013. In 2005, she received from the University of Salento the “Best M. Sc. Thesis Price 2003-2004” in memory of Eng. Gabriele De Angelis; in 2013 she was awarded by the Italian Group for Computational Mechanics (GIMC) for the Italian selection of the 2013 ECCOMAS PhD Award. Her current interests include Structural Mechanics, Solid Mechanics, Damage and Fracture Mechanics, Contact Mechanics, Isogeometric Analysis, High-Performing Computational Methods, Consulting in Applied Technologies and Technology Transfer. During 2010 and 2011 she received a research fellowship by ENEA Research Centre of Brindisi (UTTMATB-COMP) for the development and the characterization of some thermoplastic composites for thermal solar panels and adhesively bonded turbine blades under severe environmental conditions. During 2011 and 2012 she was a visiting scientist with a fellowship at the Institut für Kontinuumsmechanik Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Universität Hannover to study interfacial problems with isogeometric approaches. From 2013 to 2016 she was a researcher at the University of Salento, within the ERC starting research grant “INTERFACES” on “Computational mechanical modelling of structural interfaces based on isogeometric approaches”. From 2013 to 2019, she has collaborated, as researcher RTD-B with the University of Bologna and the Texas A&M University for a comparative assessment of some advanced numerical collocation methods with lower computational cost for fracturing problems and structural modelling of composite plates and shells, made by isotropic, orthotropic and anisotropic materials. She is author of 112 scientific publications, and she collaborates with many national or international researchers and professors worldwide, as visible from her scientific production. She also collaborates with different prestigious international journals in the structural mechanics field, as reviewer, member of the editorial board, and guest editor for different special issues.

After earning his degree in Aerospace Engineering at the Politecnico di Torino in 2005, Brischetto received his PhD in Aerospace Engineering (Politecnico di Torino) and in Mechanics (Université Paris Ouest–Nanterre La Défense) in 2009. He won the excellence prize for PhD students in 2008 and the prize for young researchers in 2011 at the Politecnico di Torino. He worked as a Research Assistant at the Politecnico di Torino from 2006 to 2010, and as Assistant Professor from 2010 to 2018; currently he is Associate Professor since February 2018. His main research topics are: smart composite structures, multifield problems, hygro-thermal stress analysis, CNTs, inflatable structures, shell 3D and 2D numerical and exact solutions, additive manufacturing and UAVs. He is the author of more than 150 articles, 77 of which have been published in international journals, and 1 patent. He serves as a reviewer for more than 100 international journals. He has been Guest Editor for Mechanics of Advanced Materials and Structures and for Technologies. He is a committee member for several international journals and 1 book series, and member of the "Shell Buckling People" web-site. He has been Teaching Assistant at the Politecnico di Torino for courses on “Computational aeroelasticity”, “Structures for aerospace vehicles”, “Nonlinear analysis of aerospace structures”, “Principles of structural mechanics”, “Aeronautic constructions”, “Aeronautic structures”, and “Numerical modelling and simulation techniques for aerospace structures”. He was chair at the Politecnico di Torino for the courses “Aeronautic law and human factors and safety” and "Design and Additive Manufacturing for Aerospace Applications", and currently for "Aeronautic constructions", "Numerical modelling and simulation techniques for aerospace structures" and "3D shell models for composite structures". He is co-founder and co-chair of the group “ASTRA: Additive manufacturing for Systems and sTRuctures in Aerospace”, and also founder and chair of the project “PoliDrone, A multipurpose modular drone produced via 3D printing".