The application of this research can be extended toAtomic Force Microscopy (AFM), biological mass sensing, and surface stress sensing. Nonlinear vibrations of piezoelectrically-actuated microcantilevers with applications to microsensors has been studied. The system has been theoretically modeled, then the model has been investigated both analytically and experimentally to study the nonlinear response of the systems and structures (e.g., microcantilever beams) and investigate the effect of various elements on the system. An important and interesting fact is that the piezoelectric layer on the microcantilever can introduces nonlinearities in the model.

Due to their ability to actuate with low to high frequencies and their light weight, piezoelectric materials are extensively used in active vibration control. The applications of this research encompass a wide range from microsystems to aerospace structures. The main objective is to modify conventional methods and come up with more efficient control methods. Currently we are working on a consensus method to use multi-agent netwrok of piezoelectric actuators for control of flexible structures. The applications of this research are from microstructures and micromachining to vibration control of aerospace structures.

Nonlinear vibrations and stability analysis of smart structures considering the instability phenomenon provides a new ability to increase the energy that the smart material can harvest due to nonlinear vibrations and chaos. The smart material is used for this research is piezoelectric material. This leads to new generation of micro and macro energy harvesters with more efficiency. Although the instability must be avoided in many systems, by better understanding the mechanics, we can employ instability for energy harvesting. Currently we are working on wind energy harvesting using piezoelectric flags. In parallel to energy harvesting application, the instability can be used for a better measurement in microscale. Since at microscale, displacements are very small, error of measurement becomes considerable. Instability can be used to give higher amplitude vibrations which can be measured with smaller error. The outcome of this research would be applied to the design and analysis of the next-generation of nanomechanical sensors, with application to microgyroscopes and biochemical mass and species detection and energy harvesting.