Anyone who’s watched long lines of waves roll off a ship’s stern has seen what physicists call a soliton, a single wave that keeps its shape while moving at a constant speed. Apart from something to watch from the deck of a boat, these complex phenomena are a unique type of wave whose motions physicists and engineers are trying to better understand.
A wave propagating across the researchers’ mechanical metamaterial at 6,000 frames per second. (Image: Penn Engineering)
In a new study published in Physical Review Letters, Jordan Raney and graduate student Chengyang Mo used a custom mechanical metamaterial, an artificial structure with properties that are defined by geometry instead of its composition, to study this phenomenon. Made out of hundreds of interconnected rubber squares that each contain a ball bearing, researchers in Penn’s Architected Materials Laboratory used a high-speed camera to record the soliton’s movements after it was hit with a mallet.
Their study is the first to show how these unique non-linear waves travel in a soft, two-dimensional system and provides a better understanding of these types of metamaterials, which could have future applications ranging from medical diagnostics to automobiles.
Novel plant-based approach to a better, cheaper GLP-1 delivery system
Research led by Penn Dental’s Henry Daniell investigates the use of a lettuce-based, plant-encapsulated delivery platform as a new oral delivery of two GLP-1 drugs previously approved by the FDA in injectable form.
No brain, no gain: Neuronal activity enhances benefits of exercise
Research led by Penn neuroscientist J. Nicholas Betley and collaborators finds that hypothalamic neurons are essential for translating physical exertion into endurance, potentially opening the door to exercise-mimicking therapies.
In honor of Valentine's Day, and as a way of fostering community in her Shakespeare in Love course, Becky Friedman took her students to the University Club for lunch one class period. They talked about the movie "Shakespeare in Love," as part of a broader conversation on how Shakespeare's works are adapted.
In Becky Friedman’s English course Shakespeare in Love, undergraduate students analyze language, genre, and adaptation in the Bard’s plays through the lens of love.
Beating the heat: Designing cooling for bodies in motion
Dorit Aviv, director of Weitzman’s Thermal Architecture Lab, studies how humans, technology, and design intersect, paving the way for the development of novel approaches to cooling people efficiently.
