Computational Dynamics

Many engineering systems rely on the combination of elastic components and frictional contact to perform tasks such as locomotion, transportation, and object manipulation. To develop predictive theories for complex high-tech systems, our research focuses on the mathematical description and numerical analysis of flexible multi-body systems with frictional contact. The dynamics of mechanical systems with frictional contact can be described within the theory of non-smooth mechanics, where the velocities of the system are allowed to jump. This is especially important for the description of collisions between rigid bodies, but also between rigid and flexible bodies. In our research on contact mechanics, we develop numerical time integration schemes for non-smooth mechanical systems that can also deal with the additional challenges posed by large stiffness differences in flexible systems.

A selection of research topics are: nonlinear rod finite elements, tendon-driven soft robots, modeling frictional contact by set-valued contact and impact laws, non-smooth time integration schemes.