Mechanical material characterization of Co nanowires and their nanocomposite

Abstract The study attempts to evaluate the complete set of effective transversely isotropic properties of a nanocomposite at various nanofiber-volume fractions through effective continuum modeling and experimental testing. The investigation starts from the theoretical and experimental assessments of the elastic properties the nanoscale Co metal using molecular dynamics (MD) simulations and nanoindentation testing, respectively. For determining the thermal-mechanical material properties of the nanocomposite, an effective finite element modeling (FEM)-based continuum modeling approach are introduced. Results show that the nanoscale Co metal presents inhomogeneity in the elastic material properties, the degree of which increases with a decreasing dimension of nanomaterials. Comparisons of the present results with experimental and existing theoretical data demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods. Furthermore, as a result of the Co filament, significant anisotropy can be found in the effective thermal-mechanical properties of the nanocomposite but surprisingly not in the effective Poisson’s ratio and coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE).