Dec
1
Vice Chair, EMI Elasticity Committee
Berkin has been elected Vice Chair of the ASCE Engineering Mechanics Institute (EMI) Elasticity Committee.
2025
Oct
10
SES 2025: Strain-gradient effects and polarization in soft materials
Presented two talks at the Society of Engineering Science (SES) 2025 Conference in Atlanta, GA:
Sep
15
IGA 2025 (Eindhoven): Surface and strain-gradient driven mechanics of soft materials using isogeometric analysis
Gave a talk at the 13th International Conference on Isogeometric Analysis (IGA 2025) in Eindhoven, Netherlands:
Jul
25
USNCCM18: Strain-gradient soft mechanics and an MPM scheme
Presented two talks at the 18th U.S. National Congress on Computational Mechanics (USNCCM18) in Chicago, IL:
Jun
1
EMI 2025: Size effects in soft materials
Gave a talk at the Engineering Mechanics Institute Conference (EMI) 2025 in Anaheim, CA:
Feb
25
Editor of the ASME Mechanics of Soft Materials Newsletter
Berkin has been elected as the new editor of the ASME (Applied Mechanics Division) Technical Committee on Mechanics of Soft Materials. According to the policy, he will continue to serve the committee as secretary, then...
Feb
13
NSF CAREER Award
The National Science Foundation has selected our group’s proposal CAREER: Multiscale Mechanics of Highly Deformable Strain-Gradient Electric Generators for the NSF CAREER Award.
2024
Oct
31
Kolodzey Travel Award
Ashkan received the Kolodzey Travel Award from the CAEE department at UT Austin, which allowed him to attend the MPM Workshop in Berkeley, CA, where he presented his research on Mechanics of Polymeric Porous Membranes...
Sep
9
15th Annual MPM Workshop (UC Berkeley): Porous polymeric membranes via stabilized extended B-spline MPM
Ashkan attended the 15th Annual MPM Workshop at the University of California, Berkeley, held from September 5-6, 2024. He gave a presentation titled Mechanics of Porous Polymeric Membranes Using Stabilized Extended B-spline Material Point Method....
Aug
12
George J. Heuer, Jr. Endowed Fellowship awarded to three lab Ph.D. students
Three of our lab’s Ph.D. students—Ashkan, Ekim, and Jun—have been awarded the George J. Heuer, Jr. Ph.D. Endowed Fellowship from the Cockrell School of Engineering for the 2024-2025 academic year. This fellowship recognizes and supports...
May
31
EMI 2024: Stabilized extended B-spline MPM for multi-field soft materials with Nitsche BCs
Ashkan, a Ph.D. student in our lab, presented his research titled “Stabilized Extended B-Spline Material Point Method for Multi-Field Soft Materials with Nitsche Imposition of Boundary Conditions” at the Engineering Mechanics Institute Conference (EMI 2024)....
May
17
Fracture of Soft Materials Symposium: Modeling nearly incompressible behavior in soft solids with MPM
Ashkan and Ekim, Ph.D. students in our lab, presented their collaborative research titled “Modeling Nearly Incompressible Behavior in Soft Solids Using the Material Point Method” at the Fracture of Soft Materials Symposium, held in Austin...
May
8
CAEE 2024 Faculty Teaching Award
Berkin is the 2024 recipient of CAEE’s Faculty Teaching Award! Nominated by CAEE students and selected by a committee of previous award recipients.
Mar
8
APS March Meeting 2024: Diffusion-induced swelling of shape morphing hydrogels
Ashkan, a Ph.D. student in our lab, presented his research titled “Diffusion-Induced Swelling of Shape Morphing Hydrogels” at the American Physical Society (APS) March Meeting 2024. The conference took place in Minneapolis from March 3...
2023
Dec
12
End-of-year gathering, 2023
Our group’s end-of-year gathering, December 2023.
Oct
12
SES 2023 (Minneapolis)
Minneapolis, October 8-11, 2023
Sep
29
CAEE renamed: Fariborz Maseeh Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering
We attended the renaming ceremony at UT Austin.
Aug
31
USNCCM17: Stabilized MPM for porous hydrogels and viscoelasto-capillary soft materials
We presented our research at the 17th U.S. National Congress on Computational Mechanics (USNCCM) held in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Aug
30
EMI 2023: B-spline MPM for poroelastic materials and adhesive–capillary forces in soft materials
We attended the Engineering Mechanics Institute Conference (EMI) held in Atlanta, Georgia in June 2023. Ashkan presented his work on “B-spline Material Point Method for Strongly Coupled Poroelastic Materials,” and Berkin talked about modeling adhesive...
Aug
26
Dr. Marco Antonio Zuniga Izaguirre Endowed Scholarship
Richard has been selected as the recipient of the prestigious Dr. Marco Antonio Zuniga Izaguirre Endowed Scholarship in Engineering and Physics.
May
23
2023 Ivo & Renata Babuska Scholarship in CSE
Richard has been awarded the 2023 Ivo & Renata Babuska Scholarship in Computational Science and Engineering. This award was established to recognize and support the studies of exceptional senior-level undergraduate students at the university who...
Mar
24
Best Presentation, 4th CAEE Graduate Symposium
Derya received the first-place prize for best presentation in the 4th CAEE Graduate Symposium held at UT Austin on March 24, with her presentation on modeling the adhesive interfaces between soft materials.
Mar
7
APS March Meeting 2023: Numerical modeling of elasto-adhesive behavior in soft materials
Derya presented her work on the numerical modeling of the elasto-adhesive behavior of soft materials at the APS March Meeting 2023 in Las Vegas. Derya attended the meeting with funds from the DSOFT Future Investigator...
2022
Nov
7
Best Poster Award, IMECE 2022 — Computing in Applied Mechanics
Congratulations Animesh for winning the BEST poster award in Computing in Applied Mechanics! (IMECE2022)
Oct
7
MPM Workshop 2022 (UT Austin): Subdivision-stabilized B-spline MPM for nonlinear nearly incompressible solids
Ashkan gave a talk titled “A subdivision-stabilized B-spline material point method for nonlinear nearly incompressible solids” in the Material Point Method Workshop . The workshop was held at UT Austin from 29th to 30th September...
Sep
30
Haythornthwaite Foundation Student Travel Award
Ashkan received Haythornthwaite Foundation Student Travel Award to attend IMECE 2022 conference and present in the Track: Mechanics of Solids, Structures and Fluids.
Sep
29
Biophysics Seminar (UT Austin): Computationally driven design of tissue-inspired multifunctional materials
We presented our research on the Computationally Driven Design of Tissue- Inspired Multifunctional Materials in the Biophysics seminar at UT Austin. More info!
Sep
11
CMAME: Modeling curvature-resisting material surfaces with isogeometric analysis
Paper titled “Modeling curvature-resisting material surfaces with isogeometric analysis” is accepted @CMAME. Huge congratulations to Animesh on this substantial work!
Aug
9
SES 2022 Travel Award
Ashkan received a travel award to present his research on “A Subdivision- stabilized B-spline Material Point Method for Nonlinear Nearly Incompressible Solids” at SES2022. Congrats, Ashkan!
May
31
Best Poster Award, 2022 CAEE Graduate Symposium
Animesh received the best poster award in the 2022 Graduate Symposium at UT Austin where he presented his recent research on “modeling curvature- resisting material surfaces.”
Apr
21
Two poster awards: 3rd-best at 2022 CAEE Graduate Symposium and Honorable Mention at Longhorn Undergraduate Research Week
Nathaniel received the third best poster award in the 2022 Graduate Symposium at UT Austin and an Honorable Mention for his poster presentation and design at the Longhorn Undergraduate Research Week.
Feb
23
Excellence in Research Award, UT GAIN Symposium
Animesh received the Excellence in Research award for his presentation on Modeling Energetic Surfaces with Curvature-Resistance in Soft Solids and Nanostructures at the UT GAIN symposium.
2021
Sep
11
Welcome, new Ph.D. student
Ashkan joins our group as a Ph.D. student in Fall 2021 after receiving his master’s degree at Sharif University of Technology, Iran. Welcome, Ashkan!
2020
Sep
11
Welcome, new M.S. student
Animesh joins our group as an M.S. student in Fall 2020 after receiving his B.S. degree at the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar. Welcome, Animesh!
Apr
30
Welcome to the Lab!
We develop advanced computational modeling and physics-based simulation techniques for i) enhancing our understanding of dynamic shape, topology, and functional changes in soft materials in nature, ii) elucidating the complete interplay between multi-physics materials and...