Solid Body Mechanics and Mechanical Design

Cliff Butcher is a professor and co-director in Waterloo’s Forming and Crash Lab. 

His research specializes in the automotive industry and ensuring cars are the safest they can be while making them lightweight.

Naveen Chandrashekar is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo. 

His research interests are in orthopaedic biomechanics, the design of biomedical devices, and tissue engineering. Professor Chandrashekar and his team are conducting innovative research on the anterior cruciate ligament, commonly known as the ACL. He has designed a simulator to enact the movements of a human knee to measure the damage inflicted on the ACL during athletic maneuvers. A sensor is attached to the mechanical ligament on the knee simulator, and readings from the sensor provide insight into how different motions and factors like movement from the hip influence the injury. Using this approach, the team is working on designing and evaluating new knee braces. 

Professor Chandrashekar teaches several upper-year Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering courses at the university. He has published several articles in the Journal of Biomechanics and the Journal of Mechanical Behaviour of Biomedical Materials. He has also taken part in several conferences such as the Annual Meetings of Orthopaedic Research Society, American Society of Biomechanics, Biennial Meeting of Canadian Society of Biomechanics, and the Annual Ontario Biomechanics Conference. Professor Chandrashekar’s research has been funded by several organizations, including the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Ontario Centres of Excellence, and the Canada Foundation for Innovation. 

Awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in January 2013.

Duane Cronin is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering, Director of the Impact Mechanics and Material Characterization (IMMC) laboratory at the University of Waterloo, and Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Trauma Biomechanics and Injury Prevention.

Dr. Cronin’s expertise lies in the areas of impact mechanics, material characterization applied to trauma biomechanics, auto crash and occupant simulation, and multi-material lightweight vehicles. 

The development of advanced numerical models and interpretation of physical test data for impact events requires a fundamental understanding of high-deformation rate material properties, followed by implementation using appropriate constitutive equations in numerical codes. Test equipment supporting this research includes a suite of high deformation rate Split Hopkinson Pressure Bar apparatus; and intermediate, rate and standard hydraulic test frames to measure mechanical properties, complemented by high-speed imaging and digital image correlation. 

The field of Impact Biomechanics seeks to understand the response of the human body to high-rate loading, the potential for injury or trauma, and methods to mitigate injury. Research areas include characterization and constitutive modelling for biological tissues, finite element implementations, and human body modelling. Detailed human body models represent an evolution in assessing occupant safety in vehicle crash scenarios through Virtual Vehicle Evaluation, and also act as tools for the design of improved vehicle safety. These innovative human models are also used to improve blast protection for the head, thorax and lower extremity, and to develop enhanced ballistic protection to mitigate Behind Armour Blunt Trauma (BABT). 

Professor Cronin’s research led him to serve on 2 NATO task groups and acting as a subject matter expert in the areas of blast and ballistic protection. He was a is a council member and board member on the International Research Council on Biomechanics of Injury (IRCOBI) for 10 years and currently leads the Neck Model Centre of Expertise for the Global Human Body Models Consortium. 

• Large elastic-plastic deformations 

• Nonlinear finite element method 

• Metal forming 

• Molecular dynamics 

Kaan Inal is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering (Cross-Appointed to the Department of Systems Design Engineering) at the University of Waterloo, ON., Canada. He received his undergraduate degree in 1996 and his Ph.D. in 2001. Dr. Inal joined the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo in 2006 where he is currently the Associate Director of Waterloo Centre for Automotive Research (WatCAR). Dr. Inal also holds a NSERC/General Motors Industrial Research Chair in “Integrated Computational Mechanics for Mass Efficient Automotive Structures”. His primary research focuses on multi-scale modeling and development of mechanism driven advanced material models for metals and composites. Accordingly, Dr. Inal has applied multiscale frameworks for several new and emerging materials to enable their applications for structural lightweighting. He also leads a research group focusing on artificial intelligence (AI) and applications of AI in solid mechanics to perform “industrial scale” simulations with advanced physics based models. His research group is one of the first, if not the first, to develop artificial intelligence based numerical frameworks for micromechanics and advanced non-linear FEM problems (crashworthiness, fracture, etc.) 

Hamid Jahed is a Professor, and University Research Chair in Cold Spray Technology in the Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering Department. He is the Director of the Fatigue and Stress Analysis Laboratory (FATSLab) at the University of Waterloo. 

Professor Jahed’s research interests lie in the cold spray technology, durability of materials and products, multiscale mechanical characterization, development of Digital Twins, and structural life enhancement technologies. 

Cold spray research focuses on application diversifications in coating, restoration and 3D printing. Areas of interest are: residual stress, fracture mechanism, printing circuits, health and environmental applications. 

Work in the Fatigue and Stress Analysis Laboratory focuses on fatigue and fracture properties of materials and joints (weld/SPR) under uniaxial and multi-axial loads, development of cyclic plasticity and life prediction models, residual stress formations and measurements, EV battery pack durability, and cost-effective manufacturing of magnesium alloys for structural applications.

Professor Jahed has been invited as keynote (e.g., SAE WCX 2022, 2021, and TMS2021), is the recipient of the International Magnesium Association 2021 Award of Excellence, and over 10 UW Faculty of Engineering Awards including Sandford Fleming Foundation Teaching Excellence Award, and Engineering Research Excellence Award. 

HJ Kwon is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo. 

His research interests include AI and machine learning, AI for manufacturing, ultrasound nondestructive testing (NDT), on-board AI for NDT, biomedical therapeutic and diagnostic ultrasounds and Fatigue and Fracture.  

His research group is actively developing various cutting-edge technologies that can make innovation and impact to manufacturing and biomedical sectors. 

Stewart McLachlin is a professor in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo, who specializes in mechanic systems as it relates to health care.  

He also runs the Orthopaedic Mechatronics Laboratory on campus, where the group specializes in research in bone-implant mechanics, computational modelling, joint motion simulation, computer-assisted orthopaedic surgery, and additive manufacturing of surgical implants and instruments.  

John Montesano is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo and the Director of the Composites Research Group (CRG). His research interests lie in the field of mechanics of fiber-reinforced composite materials and structures. 
 
Prior to joining the University of Waterloo, Prof. Montesano was an NSERC Postdoctoral Researcher in Materials Science and Engineering Department at the University of Toronto where he developed multiscale computational models to predict failure of lightweight composite structures. He received his PhD in Aerospace Engineering at Ryerson University in 2012 where he studied the long-term durability of advanced composite materials at elevated temperatures. He has more than five years of industrial experience working as a Mechanical Designer and Structural Analyst in the aerospace sector. 

Armaghan Salehian is an Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo. 

Professor Salehian’s research interests include the application of smart materials for energy harvesting, sensing, and actuation of mechanical systems. She has also performed extensive research on wrinkle modelling, flatness control, and vibrations modelling of space membranes and inflatable/deployable space structures using numerical techniques and homogenization analytical methods. 

She has collaborated with Lockheed Martin, and the United States Air Force Office of Scientific Research and has located funding from various agencies such as the Ontario Centres of Excellence, and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. 

Professor Salehian is also a member of several societies and institutes, including the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and the Canadian Aeronautics and Space Institutes. 

Michael Worswick is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering of the University of Waterloo and is Executive Director of the Waterloo Node of the Advanced Manufacturing Consortium. He held a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in “Light Weight Materials Under Extreme Deformation: Forming and Impact” (ended-June, 2018) and currently holds a University Research Chair under the same title. He co-directs the Waterloo Forming and Crash Lab and leads a research program addressing fabrication of light weight automotive body and structural components and their crash safety performance. His research activities encompass structural crash worthiness, high-strain-rate material behavior and sheet forming for auto weight reduction, within one of the largest academic laboratories for such research. The major thrust of his research is the response of materials and structures under the gross deformation conditions associated with forming and impact. All told, a major research cluster has been established, centred on Worswick’s extensive industry collaborations.