U.S.-France Cooperative Research: Boundary Layers, Interfaces and Defects in Composite Media

0003788

Vogelius

This two-year award for U.S.-France cooperative research in applied mathematics involves Michael S. Vogelius and others at Rutgers University and Gregoire Allaire and Eric Bonnetier of the Centre de Mathematiques Appliquees at the Ecole Polytechnique, Palaiseau, France. The objective of this project is to study problems related to interfaces in composite material media. The interfaces can be microscopic or macroscopic. In each case the investigators will study the effect of these interfaces on the macroscopic behavior of the composite. The project takes advantage of complementary US and French expertise in analytical and computational aspects of elliptic Partial Differential Equations (PDE) that appear in the context of composite media.

This award represents the US side of a joint proposal to the NSF and the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS). NSF will cover travel funds and living expenses for the US investigator, members of his group and some graduate students. The CNRS will support the visits of French researchers to the United States. The collaboration will contribute to modeling of inhomogeneous and multiscale materials (composites). Composite materials, due to combined strength and weight, are important to the development of new materials and new technologies.