Kon-Well Wang
University of Michigan
Seminar Information
In recent years, the concept of mechanical metastructures developed based on natureinspired synergistic modular architectures has been explored. For example, some of skeletal muscle's intriguing macroscale functionalities result from the assembly of nanoscale, cross-bridge constituents that maintain multiple metastable configurations. Inspired by this observation, recent studies investigated the idea of creating modular structures from the assembly of metastable modules, and demonstrated that such metastructures would yield effective adaptivity, including the control of global topology, significant changes in mechanical properties, and tunable nontraditional wave propagation features. In another example, inspired by the physics behind the plant nastic movements and the rich designs of origami folding, a class of metastructures is created through exploring the innovation of fluidic origami cellular systems. The origami cells can be strategically controlled to achieve tunable shape, mechanical properties and multi-stability, and produce intriguing functionalities at the system level, such as recoverable shock and energy absorption, and programmable phonic crystal for band control and wave steering. In addition, an emerging direction of such class of structures recently pioneered is to harness their high dimensionality, multistability, and high nonlinearity for mechano-intelligence and physical computing. That is, aiming to achieve computing power and intelligence directly in the mechanical domain and advance from conventional systems with add-on electronics-based platforms. This presentation will highlight some of the recent advancements, from phononic band control, wave steering, to physical computing harnessing intelligent metastructures.
Dr. Kon-Well Wang is the Stephen P. Timoshenko Professor of Mechanical Engineering (ME) at the University of Michigan (U-M). He has been the U-M ME Department Chair from 2008 to 2018, and has served as a Division Director at the U.S. National Science Foundation for two years, 2019-20, via an Executive Intergovernmental Personnel Act rotator appointment. Dr. Wang received his Ph.D. degree from the University of California at Berkeley, worked at the General Motors Research Labs as a Sr. Research Engineer, and started his academic career at the Pennsylvania State University in 1988. At Penn State, Dr. Wang has served as the William E. Diefenderfer Chaired Professor, co-founder and Associate Director of the Vertical Lift Research Center of Excellence, and a Group Leader for the Center for Acoustics & Vibration. He joined the U-M in 2008. Dr. Wang’s main technical interests are in structural dynamics and controls, especially in the emerging fields of programmable metastructures and metamaterials, origami mechanics & dynamics, and intelligent structural & material systems, with applications in vibration, wave & noise controls, energy harvesting, and sensing & monitoring. He has received various recognitions, such as the ASME Rayleigh Lecture Award, the Pi Tau Sigma-ASME Charles Russ Richards Memorial Award, the ASME J.P. Den Hartog Award, the SPIE Smart Structures and Materials Lifetime Achievement Award, the ASME Adaptive Structures and Materials Systems Prize, the ASME N.O. Myklestad Award, and the ASME Rudolf Kalman Award. He has been Chair of the ASME Technical Committee on Vibration and Sound and ASME ME Department Heads Executive Committee, Chief Editor for the ASME Journal of Vibration & Acoustics, and an Associate Editor or Editorial Board Member for many journals. Dr. Wang is a Fellow of the ASME, AAAS, and IOP.