Composite materials are being used increasingly in marine structures due to their many advantages. However, the unique and hostile marine environment, with the presence of sea water and moisture, temperature extremes, timedependent three-dimensional loading due to wave slamming, hydrostatic pressure, and other factors, gives rise to significant challenges for designers of composite marine structures. Additional requirements on Naval structures include the ability to withstand highly dynamic loading, due to weapons impact, or to air or underwater explosions.
The Solid Mechanics Research Program at the Office of Naval Research (ONR) supports research on the mechanical behavior of structural materials, providing the scientific basis for the effective design and utilization of affordable Naval structures. Today, the major focus is on marine composites and composite sandwich structures.
This research program deals with deformation, damage initiation, damage growth, failure and instability/buckling in glass fiber and carbon fiber reinforced composites and composite sandwich structures subjected to static, cyclic, and dynamic multi-axial loading conditions in severe environments. The main objectives are to understand the mechanics and physics of the processes involved, and to establish physically based models with predictive capabilities. Areas of emphasis include constitutive behavior, failure modes and mechanisms, failure criteria, environmental effects, dynamic response, and structural effects. Additionally, concepts for enhancing the mechanical properties of marine composites through the introduction of nanoparticles are being explored.
This Special Issue on "Marine Composites" contains 27 papers from leading researchers in mechanics of composite materials and sandwich structures supported by the ONR Solid Mechanics Program. The papers are grouped into the broad areas of environmental effects, deformation and failure, structural response, and dynamic effects. Examples of current research activities