A hybrid bio-inspired sandwich structures for high strain rate energy absorption applications

Abstract

Due to its advantages in terms of enhancing the performance of structures in the desired applications, the bio-inspired design approach has recently attracted the interest of researchers in a number of engineering disciplines. A hybrid bio-inspired design is suggested for the sandwich structures to absorb the energy of the blast loads in the current study. The sandwich structure's core, which often has a regular grid pattern resembling a honeycomb structure, is crucial to how well the panel absorbs energy. In order to achieve the best results, we first chose the structure of the core grid by taking into account potential 2D grids (polygons and multi-pointed stars) through Genetic Algorithm optimization. Next, we combined a bio-inspired bi-tubular thin-walled structure with the core grid to take advantage of its high energy absorption capacity. Finally, the performance of the suggested design is compared with four frequently implemented ones. The results show that the hybrid design has better energy absorption characteristics compared with the bionic and conventional designs presented in the literature.