%AYermembetova, Aiganym%ARahimi, Raheleh%AKim, Chang-Eun%ASkinner, Jack%AAndriolo, Jessica%AMurphy, John%ABahr, David%BJournal Name: MRS Advances %D2017%I %JJournal Name: MRS Advances %K %MOSTI ID: 10041087 %PMedium: X %TNanomechanics and Testing of Core-Shell Composite Ligaments for High Strength, Light Weight Foams %XABSTRACT Composite nanostructured foams consisting of a metallic shell deposited on a polymeric core were formed by plating copper via electroless deposition on electrospun polycaprolactone (PCL) fiber mats. The final structure consisted of 1000-nm scale PCL fibers coated with 100s of nm of copper, leading to final core-shell thicknesses on the order of 1000-3000 nm. The resulting open cell, core-shell foams had relative densities between 4 and 15 %. By controlling the composition of the adjuncts in the plating bath, particularly the composition of formaldehyde, the relative thickness of copper coating as the fiber diameter could be controlled. As-spun PCL mats had a nominal compressive modulus on the order of 0.1 MPa; adding a uniform metallic shell increased the modulus up to 2 MPa for sub-10 % relative density foams. A computational materials science analysis using density functional theory was used to explore the effects pre-treatment with Pd may have on the density of nuclei formed during electroless plating. %0Journal Article