The coefficient of thermal expansion of biomimetic composites

The excellent mechanical properties of biocomposites has attracted a lot of research attention, and people have started attempting to fabricate biomimetic staggered composites. In this paper, the relationship between the equivalent coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) and the microstructure of a biomimetic staggered composite is investigated. A shear-lag based thermalelastic analytical model is developed and is found to agree well with the finite element simulations. It is found that besides the volume fraction and the material constants of the constituent phases, the aspect ratio of the hard platelet plays an important role in the CTE of biocomposites. Hence, there are additional design parameters in staggered composites that can be used to adjust the CTE, which makes this type of composite promising in thermalelastic loading.