A computational and experimental study on the effective properties of Al2O3‐Ni composites

It has been demonstrated that effective medium approximation and mean field homogenization technique is a useful computational tool to predict the effective thermal and structural properties of alumina‐nickel (Al2O3‐Ni) composites. Nickel particle size and volume fraction, thermal interface resistance and porosity are found significant factors that affect thermal conductivity, elastoplastic behavior, elastic modulus and thermal expansion coefficient of Al2O3‐Ni composite. To complement the computational design, Al2O3‐Ni composite samples with designed range of volume fractions and nickel particle size are developed using spark plasma sintering process and properties are measured for model verification.