Best PhD Thesis in Applied and Computational Mechanics 2024 was, once again, awarded to LAETA

The doctoral work entitled «Multi-Scale Modeling and Design of PC/ABS Polymer Blends: Integrating Constitutive Modeling with Bayesian Optimization for Inverse Problem Solutions» won the award for Best PhD Thesis in Applied and Computational Mechanics 2024 granted by APMTAC – Portuguese Association for Applied Theoretical and Computational Mechanics.

The award-winning thesis was authored by Ana Francisca Carvalho Alves, an FCT PhD fellow at the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto, and hosted at INEGI. It was supervised by Professor Francisco Pires, Integrated Member of LAETA, and co-supervised by Bernardo Ferreira.

This doctoral research project focuses on the development of a multi-scale framework for the design and modeling of PC/ABS polymer blends.

Within this setting, a finite strain visco-elastic visco-plastic constitutive model is developed to accurately predict the behavior of the blend's constituents, incorporating phenomena such as internal particle cavitation and void growth.

Moreover, an optimization-based parameter identification strategy based on a novel Composite Bayesian Optimization approach is established to calibrate the models’ material parameters and to guide the design of new and enhanced materials in a completely unsupervised way.

Overall, the numerical results validate the proposed design framework for PC/ABS, but also demonstrate a high flexibility of application to different material systems.