Investigation of Adhesive Joining Strategies for the Application of a Multi-Material Light Rail Vehicle.

To meet the high demand for lightweight energy-efficient and safe structures for transport applications, a current state-of-the-art light rail vehicle structure is under development that adopts a multi-material design strategy. This strategy creates the need for advanced multi-material joining technologies. The compatibility of the adhesive with a wide range of material types and the possibility of joining multi-material structures is also a key advantage to its success.

Stress-oscillation behaviour of semi-crystalline polymers: the case of poly(butylene succinate).

Stress oscillation has been observed in a number of linear thermoplastic polymers during the cold-drawing process, where the polymers exhibit periodic self-excited oscillatory neck propagation. However, the origin of the mechanical stress oscillation process and its relationship with the crystalline morphology of the polymer are still under debate. In this work, we revisit the stress oscillation behavior by studying a semi-crystalline polyester, poly(butylene succinate) (PBS), a biodegradable polymer suitable for biomedical and packaging applications.

Properties and self-assembled packing morphology of long alkyl-chained substituted polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxanes (POSS) cages.

Polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane (POSS) cubic cage systems (octa-n-octadecyloctasilsesquioxane, (T8C18) and octakis(n-octadecyldimethylsiloxy)octasilsesquioxane, (Q8C18)) were synthesised with eight long n-alkyl chain (R = C18H37) substituent arms, as model nano-functionalized compounds. The crystalline packing morphology of the cages was studied using time-resolved Small- and Wide-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS/WAXS), thermal and optical techniques. From thermal analysis the melting and crystallization temperatures of the Q8 cage were significantly less than those for the T8 cage.