Energy absorption characteristics and multi-objective optimization of 3D bionic negative Poisson’s ratio honeycomb

This paper introduces a new bionic cell element with a negative Poisson’s ratio, which is derived from the traditional re-entrant hexagonal cell element. By incorporating rotation into the two-dimensional (2D) cell element, a three-dimensional (3D) cell element is formed, which exhibits enhanced mechanical properties. The 3D honeycomb is obtained by arraying the 3D cell elements and is enhanced by adding longitudinal ribs to the honeycomb. The present study employs the ABAQUS/EXPLICIT software to investigate the correlation between various compression velocities and the crashworthiness and energy absorption capacity of a given system. The effects of different compression velocities on the 3D honeycomb deformation pattern and energy absorption performance are analyzed. The simulation results show that the new bionic negative Poisson’s ratio honeycomb has better crashworthiness and energy absorption capacity than the traditional re-entrant hexagonal honeycomb. The nominal stress-strain curves of different honeycombs and the energy absorbed per unit mass of honeycomb are compared and analyzed, and the NSGA-II genetic algorithm is used to perform a multi-objective optimization analysis of the peak stress and energy absorbed per unit mass of honeycomb. The results show that the optimized honeycomb can increase the absorbed energy per unit mass by 7.5 % when the peak stress is the same as the initial honeycomb, while the peak stress can be reduced by 9.6 % when the absorbed energy per unit mass is the same.