Executive Summary : | Nature's rich diversity in mechanisms, materials, and design has fascinated mankind for centuries. Biomimicry uses these principles to engineer niche materials for various applications, such as mechanical strength, impact-resistance, self-cleaning, and self-healing. Two natural materials that exhibit exceptional strength, toughness, and impact resistance are nacre and dactyl club shells. Research has intensified in mimicking the unique hierarchical structure of these materials to enhance their mechanical properties. However, a detailed, atomistic model that encompasses their full hierarchy (from nano to microscale) is crucial for elucidating the mechanisms responsible for their properties. This work aims to develop realistic, large-scale molecular models for combining the design motifs of both nacre and dactyl club while preserving the full hierarchical structure. The composite will incorporate the myriad mechanisms of strengthening and toughening in each material, with the hard phase modeled as crystalline alumina, the polymeric phase as PMMA, and the helicoidal phase as stacks of CNTs. Additional reinforcement via hexagonal Boron Nitride (hBN) will be introduced to amplify strength and toughness. All-atom and coarse-grained models will be built to explain deformation mechanisms responsible at length scales ranging from nanometers to microns. The development of next-generation ultra-strong and ultra-tough light-weight composites via biomimicry will involve developing realistic models for various interactions between components and establishing detailed structure-property correlations through variations in composition, sizes of components, and interaction nature. |