Shark skin biomimetic surface modification for plates: influence on free vibration response

Abstract

Denticle microstructures in shark skin have intrigued researchers since they can be prospective for various marine applications due to their inherent properties which help in reducing drag as well as do not allow barnacles to form on its surface. However, any such alterations to create surface rivulets will invariably lead to changes in mass and stiffness, and thereby natural frequencies. Subsequently, the dynamic response will also be influenced as these hydrodynamic phenomena are strongly dependent on the natural frequencies. Therefore, in this work, an investigation of the effect of shark skin type biomimetic surface modifications on the free vibration response is investigated. The free vibration response of plates with shark skin is computed first using a high-fidelity numerical simulation in a commercial finite element package ABAQUS and then compared against a simplified semi-analytical model proposed herein. Results from both these methods agreed quite well. It is observed that shark skin denticles significantly influence the natural frequency without altering its mode shapes. It appears that adding shark skin like dermal denticles on the surface of a bare plate as an appendage helps in reducing the natural frequencies in each mode. The study also reveals that the reduction in the spacing between denticles reduces natural frequency even further. Therefore, the effect of these wettability altercations on free vibration response should be known apriori for efficient design.