On the vibrational characteristics of single-walled boron nitride nanotubes/polymer nanocomposites: A finite element simulation

Abstract

The finite element method is used here to investigate the vibrational behavior of single-walled boron nitride nanotube/polymer nanocomposites. The polymer matrix is modeled as a continuous media. Besides, nanotubes are modeled as a space-frame structure. It is shown that increasing the length of nanotubes at a constant volume fraction leads to decreasing of the nanocomposite frequency. By investigating the effect of volume percentage on the frequencies of the boron nitride nanotube-reinforced polymer nanocomposites, it is observed that for short nanotubes, the nanocomposites with larger nanotube volume fractions have larger frequencies. Also, through studying the first 10 frequencies of nanocomposites reinforced by armchair and zigzag nanotubes, it is shown that the effect of chirality on the vibrational behavior of nanocomposite is insignificant. © 2017 World Scientific Publishing Company.