Design, Analysis, and Fabrication of Negative

Poisson’s Ratio Materials using Additive

Manufacturing

By

Osama Rizwan 180704

Mehmood Ul Hassan 180732
Ashfaq Mahmood 180686

Project Advisor: Air Cdr Dr Babar Saeed

Co-Advisor: Air Cdr Dr Ibraheem Haneef

DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL AND AEROSPACE ENGINEERING

AIR UNIVERSITY, ISLAMABAD.

Negative Poisson’s Ratio Structures – An Introduction
Typically, a structure shrinks along transverse direction when tensile load is applied along the
longitudinal direction and a structure expands along transverse direction when compressive load
is applied along the longitudinal direction. Unlike this behavior of conventional structures, an
‘auxetic structure’ experiences expansion along transverse direction when tensile load is applied
along the longitudinal direction and undergoes compression along transverse direction when
compressive load is applied along the longitudinal direction. This unusual behavior of auxetic
structures is attributed to negative poisons ratio.

Figure 1: Deformation behavior of honeycomb and auxetic structures under tensile load

Mechanical Benefits
The auxetic structures have certain advantages over conventional honeycomb structures which
make them desirable for aerospace applications. Many mechanical properties depend on Poisson’s
ratio, the negative Poisson’s ratio results in the enhancement of many of these properties. Auxetic
structures have improved energy absorption, indentation and impact resistance, high shear
strength, fracture toughness and energy absorption as compared to the conventional honeycomb
structure.

Applications
The properties of auxetics make them desirable for many applications in different fields. Due to
their high strength to weight ratio, high impact resistance, high shear resistance, high fracture
toughness, high thermal shock resistance, high energy and noise absorption and synclastic
deformation, auxetic materials are particularly useful in aerospace industry. Due to their high shear
resistance, they can be used to make shear load carrying parts of an aircraft such as wings.
Auxetic materials find their application in many industries including:

 Automotive industry
 Aerospace Industry
 Sports applications
 Textile industry
 Medical industry

Scope of Project
The Project will include literature review of the Negative Poisson’s ratio structures and
identification of their potential applications. Different unit cells; that comprise to from a Negative
Poisson’s ratio structure; with different geometries will be analyzed using FEM Analysis. After
selecting the final geometries, fabrication of a 2D layer of Negative Poisson’s ratio structure will
be done using additive manufacturing technique. In this regard, 3D printing will serve the
purpose of fabrication. Once the fabrication is done, testing will be carried out to experimentally
determine the behavior of auxetic structure. A validation process will proceed to compare the
experimental data with the theoretical one. Finally, recommendations will be suggested for future
work and a conclusion will be drawn afterwards.

Acknowledgement
After completion of our research work, we will write and publish a research article in which an
acknowledgement section will be added. In this section, assistance provided during the research,
by Pakistan Institute of Additive Manufacturing (PIAM-3D) will be mentioned. Moreover,
contribution of all sorts will be stated. Additionally, names of respective contributors will be added
in the list of authors.

Dr. Babar Saeed Dr. Ibraheem Haneef

Faculty Member, DMAE-IAA Chair Department, DMAE
Air University, Islamabad. DG IAA, Air University, Islamabad.

Signature:______________________ Signature:______________________
Date:__________________________ Date:__________________________