Development of a full range multi-scale model to obtain elastic properties of CNT/polymer composites

Abstract

The main goal of this study was to develop a full range multi-scale modeling technique to extract Young’s modulus and Poisson’s ratio of carbon nanotube reinforced polymer (CNTRP) composites covering all nano, micro, meso and macro scales. The developed model consists of two different phases as top-down scanning and bottom-up modeling. At the first stage, the material region will be scanned from the macro level downward to the nano-scale. Effective parameters associated with each scale will be identified through this scanning procedure. Taking into account identified effective parameters of each specific scale, the suitable representative volume elements (RVE) will be defined for all nano, micro, meso and macro scales, separately. In the second stage of the modeling procedure, a hierarchical multi-scale modeling approach is developed. This modeling strategy would analyze the material at each scale and obtained results that were fed to the upper scale as input information. Due to involved random parameters, the developed modeling technique is implemented stochastically. It has been shown that the developed modeling procedure provides a clear insight to the properties of CNTRP and it is a very efficient tool for simulation of mechanical behavior of CNTRP composites. A sensitivity analysis was conducted to quantify the influence of the identified random parameters on the overall behavior of CNTRP.