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Abstract:
These last few years have seen the appearance of novel materials for technological applications with unusual features and properties. Synthesis of extremely low-hysteresis shape-memory alloys, soft thin membranes and programmables structures where one has the critical interaction of topological defects and geometric constraints have suggested and motivated the development of new mathematical models and methods possibly based on the variational principle as well as stochastic processes.
In this proposed special session we leave the material and the application at the centre stage. Topics of interests are formation of interfaces and discontinuities in phase-transforming materials, avalanches, nucleation and evolution of complex structures, effects of topology, geometry and randomness on the mechanical properties of (smart) materials.
We intend to gather mathematicians, materials scientists and experimentalists working on materials and physical systems from their own peculiar perspective with the specific purpose of stimulating constructive discussion and interaction.
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