Keynote Speakers

Toughening of adhesively bonded joints – a sustainable transition to biobased adhesives

Adhesive bonding is a suitable joining technology for both single and multi-material structures as it can deliver high performance structural joints without penalizing the substrate materials. However, the potential sudden failure and limited crack arresting capability of the current bonded joints, as well as the inability of non-destructively detecting interface failure, are limiting their application in load-bearing structures. Developing innovative toughening mechanisms is crucial to improve the reliability of bonded joints. These are currently refocused on interface and adhesive patterning, substrate design and in inclusion of microstructures and no longer limited to changes in the adhesive material or on conventional rivets to stop a growing crack. At the same time, the world is seeking for decreasing its dependency on oil-based products. High performance adhesives are often using oil-based chemical components. Biobased counterparts often deliver poor performance. This leads to the key question of how to improve the reliability of bonded joints while transitioning to biobased materials and hence contribute to the decarbonization of our planet.

Short Bio

Sofia Teixeira de Freitas is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering in Delft University of Technology. Her research focuses on the fracture and damage mechanisms of bonded interfaces and has the mission to generate durable and sustainable load bearing structures. She is the recipient of the Young Talent innovation award by the Dutch Organization for Scientific Research (VENI) and the Delft Technology Fellowship. She is currently the Chair of the COST Action CERTBOND which gathers +25 European countries and +90 members on the topic of composite bonded joints. She is also an accredited group facilitator and a member of the Diversity and Inclusion committee at the TU Delft. Sofia believes that developing an academic world grounded in cooperation and inclusion is crucial to break the technology limits to truly achieve a sustainable society.