Nature-Inspired Lightweight Cellular Co-Continuous Composites with Architected Periodic Gyroidal Structures

Shell-core cellular composites are a unique class of cellular materials, where the base constituent is made of a composite material such that the best distinctive physical and/or mechanical properties of each phase of the composite are employed. In this work, the authors demonstrate the additive manufacturing of a nature inspired cellular three-dimensional (3D), periodic, co-continuous, and complex composite materials made of a hard-shell and soft-core system. The architecture of these composites is based on the Schoen's single Gyroidal triply periodic minimal surface. Results of mechanical testing show the possibility of having a wide range of mechanical properties by tuning the composition, volume fraction of core, shell thickness, and internal architecture of the cellular composites. Moreover, a change in deformation and failure mechanism is observed when employing a shell-core composite system, as compared to the pure stiff polymeric standalone cellular material. This shell-core configuration and Gyroidal topology allowed for accessing toughness values that are not realized by the constituent materials independently, showing the suitability of this cellular composite for mechanical energy absorption applications.