COMSOL Now Blog Posts
Hear About Designing Efficient Appliances from Mieletec FH Bielefeld
In 1898, Carl Miele and Reinhard Zinkann founded the Miele company. Since then, it has grown into one of the world’s foremost producers of household appliances, including washing machines and cooking devices for both domestic and professional use. Miele has created a joint research laboratory, mieletec, with the University of Applied Sciences in Bielefeld, Germany. There, the foundations are being laid for the next generation of resource and energy efficient household appliances. This October, you have the chance to hear […]
ETREMA to Talk About Transducer Design using Smart Materials
Julie Slaughter and her team at ETREMA Products are in the enviable position as the sole U.S. provider of the smart material Terfenol-D, and developer of products based on this material. Terfenol-D is said to produce giant magnetostriction that boasts strains 100 times higher than traditional magnetostrictive materials, such as iron. Just imagine the possibilities of applications harnessing this amazing material property. If you’re attending the COMSOL Conference in Boston this October, you will hear ETREMA talk about transducer design […]
Past, Present, and Future of 3D Printing
There are many necessary steps required in order to create a superior product. Based on some initial (or existing) design, you first need to evaluate the physical characteristics of the system. Once some level of understanding of the system has been obtained, it should then be possible to refine and optimize the design based on some reasonable choice of a figure of merit for a good design. The final stage is to prototype the design, which is where 3D printing […]
Report from the Joint CAA-ASA Acoustics Conference
Last month, the Acoustical Society of America (ASA) and the Canadian Acoustical Association (CAA) held the 21st joint meeting of the International Congress on Acoustics (ICA) in Montreal, Canada. This joint congress is one of the major acoustics conferences of 2013, featuring a range of parallel sessions that covered most topics in acoustics. These included, among other things, psycho acoustics, underwater acoustics, transducer modeling, acoustics of musical instruments, nonlinear acoustics, and many more. This year’s acoustics conference also featured a […]
Keynote Speaker from Philips to Talk about Pulmonary Drug Delivery
Philips Research Laboratories, located in Eindhoven, is often considered to be an incubator of ideas. The prestigious institute has traditionally been the core of all new product developments at Philips, and many of their forefront discoveries were made here. In October, Senior Scientist Alwin Verschueren of Philips Research Laboratories will hold a keynote talk on pulmonary drug delivery at the COMSOL Conference Rotterdam 2013.
Food Science Leverages Simulations
As computer hardware becomes more powerful and affordable, simulations are becoming commonplace in new disciplines of science and engineering. Food science engineering is one such area, and there is no shortfall of publications using COMSOL Multiphysics for food-related simulations. Such kinds of analyses pretty much always require several types of physics to be practically relevant.
The Graphene Revolution: Part 5
In a paper titled “Choosing a Gate Dielectric for Graphene Based Transistors“, the applications of a semiconducting form of graphene are examined. As we have seen before, single-layer graphene is not a semiconductor, it is a zero bandgap conductor (a semimetal). Efforts are well underway to introduce bandgaps to graphene, which would make it semiconducting with a room temperature mobility an order of magnitude higher than silicon. The race is already underway to find applications for such a material once […]
This Just In: COMSOL Multiphysics 4.3b
We’ve been dropping hints for the past few weeks here on the blog, and the time has finally come when we can officially unveil the release of COMSOL Multiphysics 4.3b. Five new products extend our product suite, and there are plenty of new features to enhance your simulation experience. The latest version of COMSOL Multiphysics is here, and you do not want to miss out on the news.
The Graphene Revolution: Part 4
Graphene can be created by way of thermal decomposition at high vacuum. In order to design and optimize these high-vacuum systems engineers might look to simulation, but there are currently not many modeling tools that are up to the task. Let’s have a look at how vacuum systems are relevant to graphene production, why you should simulate them, and how.
IEEE Spectrum Puts the Spotlight on Multiphysics
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is doing some really cool things for its members. Chances are that you have attended their top rated conferences, downloaded papers from IEEE Xplore, or participated in one of many local chapter events. For electrical engineers like me, IEEE certainly is a rock to lean on for continued education and to connect with colleagues from around the world. Even if you are not a member you can tap into IEEE resources such […]
Smart Materials Innately Transduce Energy, How Smart
Smart materials are able to convert one form of energy to another. These materials can be either solid or fluid, and are typically located within what’s called a smart structure. What makes these materials and structures so “smart”? Let’s find out.
The Graphene Revolution: Part 2
In a previous blog entry I discussed some of the exotic properties of graphene. The fact that graphene consists of a single layer of atoms means the aspect ratio of any graphene-based structure may be very high. High aspect geometries present their own array of modeling challenges.
How to Model Multiphysics in Multimaterial?
Dr. Raj Thiagarajan is a prolific producer of interesting research articles ranging from waste-water treatment to acoustics metamaterials, and lots in between. As the Managing Director at ATOA (“Atom TO Application”) Scientific Technologies, a COMSOL Certified Consultant, Raj has had to simulate all types of applications. Now he will show you how to use multiphysics simulations in multimaterial and composite product design.
Introduction to COMSOL Multiphysics, a Book to Get you Started
What does it take to get started using COMSOL Multiphysics? Of course, it depends on where you set the bar. However, grasping the workflow and handling the basic tools can be relatively easy to pick up. To make this process even smoother, first-time users will benefit from the recent major update of the COMSOL Multiphysics instruction manual. The book, Introduction to COMSOL Multiphysics, is a valuable tool for learning COMSOL simulation software and the new version is now available for […]
When Marshmallows Become Rock-hard
A while back, I bought a bag of marshmallows, indulged a bit, and then forgot about the opened bag for a few weeks. To my surprise, and disappointment, when my marshmallows cravings returned the top ones were rock-hard while the bottom ones were almost as soft as when I bought them. Why was this the case? By leaving the bag open, water had migrated from the marshmallows into the air.
Boosting COMSOL’s Cooperation with Siemens PLM Software
In April last year, we entered into a partnership with Siemens PLM Software and started developing the functionality that would connect COMSOL Multiphysics® simulations to Solid Edge® CAD modeling. Siemens gave us access to their tool, and we were quick in developing LiveLink™ for Solid Edge® as part of the version 4.3a release. This project led to boosting our cooperation with Simens PLM Software, as we had already implemented Parasolid® to be an integral part of the CAD Import Module […]
What is Efficiency?
When I first heard about Carnot’s theorem, I was impressed with its simplicity. Yet, no matter the amount of hard thinking we put into the design of everyday heat engines, we will never reach the efficiency of a Carnot engine. Still, modern-day heat engines are still effective as they get us from point A to point B by car or truck.
SolidWorks World: Human Space Flight and Autonomous Flying Robots
SolidWorks always puts on a great show. I just got back from SolidWorks World where I was able to go to a number of technical sessions, and understand how CAD design can better complement finite-element analysis. We had a booth there, and it was great to meet a few COMSOL users, who like to use SolidWorks® and COMSOL Multiphysics together via LiveLink™ for SolidWorks®. I also got to meet potential customers-to-be. In typical SolidWorks World fashion, I and the other […]
Magnetic Shells Designed to Improve Energy Transfer
Engineers and scientists are known to step up to the challenges posed by nature. After developing an understanding of how the current object or process works, the next step often includes figuring out how to manipulate the situation to improve said object or process. One such example is cloaking; controlling light and sound waves to render something invisible. Phys.org recently ran a story on progressive research on controlling magnetic fields via cloaking to harvest and transfer energy using a magnetic […]
Keynote Video: Multiphysics Solutions for Advanced Vehicle R&D
Hybrid vehicles are no longer a new concept, but that does not mean research and development (R&D) has ceased. If anything, it is ramping up as demand for hybrid design optimization continues to grow. Ercan Dede from Toyota Research Institute of North America held a keynote talk at the COMSOL Conference Boston 2012 on how they are using multiphysics modeling for advanced vehicle systems R&D. If you weren’t there, you can now watch his keynote in a video format instead.
Specification Chart Uncovers Solutions to Your Engineering Problems
It should be as easy as possible to find the tools you need in the COMSOL® software so that you can spend more time using it to understand, predict, and optimize your engineering designs. This is where the Specification Chart comes in.
Keynote Video: Multiphysics Simulation for Patient Safety
The second video in our COMSOL Conference Boston 2012 keynote series features Dr. Alan Leewood’s presentation on the use of multiphysics simulation for medical safety applications. The focus of this presentation is on the safety of passive conductive implants during MRI screenings.
First Keynote Video Takes Us to Babel
One of the differences between this year’s COMSOL Conference, and previous years’, is that this year we filmed a lot of it. During the next few weeks we will be publishing some of these videos for those that were there, to enjoy it once again, and for those that weren’t to get a taste of what went on. To kick these all off, I’m proud to present the first keynote video, which takes us to Babel.
Thank You for Attending the COMSOL Conference Bangalore 2012
On November 2-3 the COMSOL conference made its stop in Bangalore, India. This two-day event hosted eminent keynote speakers, user presentations, minicourses, poster sessions, and finally closed with an awards ceremony. Here’s a re-cap of the highlights of the COMSOL Conference Bangalore 2012:
