Determination of Young's modulus in polyester-Al2O3 and epoxy-Al2O3 nanocomposites using the Digital Image Correlation method

Young's modulus of nano-composite systems composed of unsaturated polyester and epoxy resins with alumina nanoparticles of different sizes has been experimentally estimated. The nanoparticles used were spherical alpha-Al2O3 having 30-40 and 200 nm in diameter. Young's modulus was estimated using an inverse problem that is solved by means of the classical Levenberg-Marquardt technique. A cantilever beam under bending was used in the experiments and the experimental procedure was performed using the Digital Image Correlation method, which is a well-established optical-numerical method for estimating full-field displacement. Experimental results indicate that Young's modulus increases with increasing nanoparticle volume fraction. Finally, the estimated Young's moduli were compared with classical theoretical models, showing that the experimental results are in agreement with literature data. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.