High performance fibre-reinforced cementitious composite (CARDIFRC) - Performance and application to retrofitting

This paper describes first some of the recent performance checks on the high performance fibre-reinforced cementitious composite CARDIFRC and then its application to the retrofitting of damaged concrete beams. It is shown that an even distribution of fibres throughout the bulk of the material is crucial to its excellent fatigue performance and to the reduction in the autogenous shrinkage strains. The distribution of fibres in beams, cylinders and strips is examined using computerised tomography imaging and traditional image analysis. Thin strips of CARDIFRC are used to retrofit damaged concrete beams which are subjected to thermal cycling. It is shown that neither the load carrying capacity of the retrofitted beams nor the bond between retrofit strips and concrete deteriorates with thermal cycling. The load carrying capacity of retrofitted beams is predicted with a model based on fracture mechanics, and the predictions are shown to be in good agreement with test data. © 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Friction between carbon fibre reinforced polymers: Experiments and modelling

Carbon fibre reinforced polymers (CFRP) are well-known for the excellent combination of mechanical and thermal properties with light weight. However, their tribological properties are still largely uncovered. In this work an experimental study of friction between two CFRP at weak normal load (inferior to 20 N) was performed. Two effects were scrutinuously studied during the experiments: fibre volume friction and fibre orientation. In addition to this experimental work, a modelling of a contact between two FRP was realized. It is supposed that the real area of contact consists of a multitude of microcontacts of three types: fibre-fibre, fibre-matrix and matrix-matrix. The experimental work has shown a small rise in friction coefficient with the change of fibre orientation of two composites from parallel to perpendicular relative to the sliding direction. In parallel, the proposed analytical model predicts a independence of this angle. Regarding the influence of the fibre volume fraction, Vf, the experiments reveal a decrease in friction coefficient of 50% with a change of Vf from 0% to 62%. This observation corresponds to the qualitative dependence depicted with the model. © 2012 EDP Sciences.

Mechanical behaviour of electrospun fibre-reinforced hydrogels.

Mechanically robust and biomimicking scaffolds are needed for structural engineering of tissues such as the intervertebral disc, which are prone to failure and incapable of natural healing. Here, the formation of thick, randomly aligned polycaprolactone electrospun fibre structures infiltrated with alginate is reported. The composites are characterised using both indentation and tensile testing and demonstrate substantially different tensile and compressive moduli. The composites are mechanically robust and exhibit large strains-to-failure, exhibiting toughening mechanisms observed in other composite material systems. The method presented here provides a way to create large-scale biomimetic scaffolds that more closely mimic the composite structure of natural tissue, with tuneable tensile and compressive properties via the fibre and matrix phases, respectively.

2×56-Gb/s mode-division multiplexed transmission over 2km of OM2 multimode fibre without MIMO equalization

A Spatial Light Modulator is used to optically demultiplex modal channels on the basis of degenerate propagation constants using a shared phase mask for all channels. This allows groups of modes to be routed to common output fibres eliminating the need for MIMO equalization to transmit 2×56Gb/s QPSK over 2km of OM2 grade 50μm core MMF. © 2012 Optical Society of America.

Mode multiplexing at 2×20Gbps over 19-cell hollow-core photonic band gap fibre

This paper demonstrates the first mode-multiplexed system over 19-cell hollow-core photonic band gap fibre, at 2×20Gbps using the LP0,1 and LP2,1-like modes. © 2012 OSA.

2x56-Gb/s mode-division multiplexed transmission over 2km of OM2 multimode fibre without MIMO equalization

A Spatial Light Modulator is used to optically demultiplex modal channels on the basis of degenerate propagation constants using a shared phase mask for all channels. This allows groups of modes to be routed to common output fibres eliminating the need for MIMO equalization to transmit 2x56Gb/s QPSK over 2km of OM2 grade 50μm core MMF. © 2012 OSA.

Demonstration of radio-over-fibre transmission of broadband MIMO over multimode fibre using mode division multiplexing

A novel method for sending MIMO wireless signals to remote antenna units over a single multimode fibre is proposed. MIMO streams are sent via different fibre modes using mode division multiplexing. Combined channel measurements of 2km MMF and a typical indoor radio environment show in principle a 2×2 MIMO link at carrier frequencies up to 6GHz. © 2012 Optical Society of America.

FEC-free 50 m 1.5 Gb/s plastic optical fibre link using CAP modulation for home networks

LED-based carrierless amplitude and phase modulation is investigated for a multi-gigabit plastic optical fibre link. An FPGA-based 1.5 Gbit/s error free transmission over 50 m standard SI-POF using CAP64 is achieved, providing 2.9 dB power margin without forward error correction. © 2012 Optical Society of America.

Mode multiplexing at 2×20Gbps over 19-cell hollow-core photonic band gap fibre

This paper demonstrates the first mode-multiplexed system over 19-cell hollow-core photonic band gap fibre, at 2×20Gbps using the LP0,1 and LP2,1-like modes. © 2012 OSA.

Precise modal excitation in multimode fibre for control of modal dispersion and mode-group division multiplexing

Each mode of a multimode fibre is excited using binary phase patterns on a Spatial Light Modulator and verified by observation of the near-field leaving the fibre and analysis of the step response. © 2011 OSA.

Adaptive enhancement of multimode fibre bandwidth by twin-spot offset launch

A binary grating on a Spatial Light Modulator generates twin antiphase spots with adjustable positions across the core of a multimode fibre allowing adaptive excitation of antisymmetric mode-groups for improving modal dispersion or modal multiplexing. © 2011 AOS.

Monolithic electro-optically modulated VCSEL suitable for radio over fibre applications to 20 GHz

An integrated EOM VCSELs is shown to offer high linearity (92dB/Hz2/3 at 6GHz) and by extrapolation ~90dB/Hz2/3 up to 20GHz. Successful modulation with IEEE 802.11g signals is demonstrated at 6GHz with a 12dB dynamic range. © OSA/OFC/NFOEC 2011.

MIMO System capacity improvements using radio-over-fibre distributed antenna system technology

The effect of antenna separation in a 3×3 MIMO system using RoF DAS technology is investigated. Larger antenna separation is found to improve the throughput due to reduced channel correlation and improved SNR. © OSA/OFC/NFOEC 2011.

Characterization and deformation response of orthotropic fibre networks with auxetic out-of-plane behaviour

In the present paper, highly porous fibre networks made of 316L fibres, with different fibre volume fractions, are characterized in terms of network architecture, elastic constants and fracture energies. Elastic constants are measured using quasi-static mechanical and modal vibration testing, yielding local and globally averaged properties, respectively. Differences between quasi-static and dynamic elastic constants are attributed to through-thickness shear effects. Regardless of the method employed, networks show signs of material inhomogeneity at high fibre densities, in agreement with X-ray nanotomography results. Strong auxetic (or negative Poisson's ratio) behaviour is observed in the through-thickness direction, which is attributed to fibre kinking induced during processing. Measured fracture energies are compared with model predictions incorporating information about in-plane fibre orientation distribution, fibre volume fraction and single fibre work of fracture. Experimental values are broadly consistent with model predictions, based on the assumption that this energy is primarily associated with plastic deformation of individual fibres within a process zone of the same order as the inter-joint spacing. © 2013 Published by Elsevier Ltd. on behalf of Acta Materialia Inc. All rights reserved.

Mechanical behaviour of electrospun fibre-reinforced hydrogels

Mechanically robust and biomimicking scaffolds are needed for structural engineering of tissues such as the intervertebral disc, which are prone to failure and incapable of natural healing. Here, the formation of thick, randomly aligned polycaprolactone electrospun fibre structures infiltrated with alginate is reported. The composites are characterised using both indentation and tensile testing and demonstrate substantially different tensile and compressive moduli. The composites are mechanically robust and exhibit large strains-to-failure, exhibiting toughening mechanisms observed in other composite material systems. The method presented here provides a way to create large-scale biomimetic scaffolds that more closely mimic the composite structure of natural tissue, with tuneable tensile and compressive properties via the fibre and matrix phases, respectively. © 2014 Springer Science+Business Media New York.