Elijah McCoy was a Canadian-American engineer best known for inventing a steam engine lubrication system that transformed the railroad industry. A supposed source of the phrase “the real McCoy”, his impact was significant enough to land him a place in the U.S. National Inventors Hall of Fame. Hop on board with us as we celebrate Elijah McCoy’s birthday with a quick trip through his life and work. Early Life and Education McCoy was born on May 2, 1844, in Colchester, Ontario, to George and Mildred Goins McCoy. Well before his birth, his parents escaped enslavement in Kentucky and managed to tra ..read more

Learn how to build custom simulation apps based on your models in our new, 8-part Learning Center course, which provides an overview of the Application Builder, part of the core package of the COMSOL Multiphysics® software. No programming experience is required as we take you on a self-guided introduction to building and customizing your first simulation app. After completing the course, you can quickly start developing simple apps of your own models. Get an overview of the course below and then start the course by clicking the button at the bottom of this blog post. Workspace and Workflo ..read more

Composites are widely used in industrial applications. Compared to the traditional monolithic materials, composites can have specialized material properties due to the customization of constituents, making them versatile and applicable to many different industries, such as in areas like aerospace engineering and biomedical engineering. Homogenization techniques are needed to numerically compute the material properties of composites and can be used for the customization and design of versatile materials. In this blog post, we are going to look at a simulation app developed in the COMSOL Mu ..read more

When you speak up in a virtual meeting, recite voice commands into smart devices, or talk over the phone, there’s a good chance it’s MEMS technology that picks up your voice. This is due to the frequent use of this solid-state semiconductor technology in creating small speakers that produce high-quality sound. In this blog post, we explore the benefits that MEMS bring to microphones, the challenges that come with producing MEMS microphones, and how modeling and simulation can help make the design process of these microphones more efficient. We also discuss the latest advancements in modern mic ..read more

I watched the latest Top Gun movie, Top Gun: Maverick a few weeks ago. It is a really awesome movie, and it is also cutting edge from an engineering standpoint. The movie starts with Maverick, played by Tom Cruise, working as a test pilot preparing to fly a new secretly developed airplane, the Darkstar, capable of flying Mach 10. Simultaneously, Rear Admiral Chester Cain, played by Ed Harris, makes his way to the test base to shut down the program — considering the Darkstar had not yet been able to fly Mach 10, which was a requirement for the project to continue — but Maverick takes action bef ..read more

One of the more common questions we get is: What is the best way to evaluate stresses in the presence of singularities? The most accurate answer is to avoid doing so. However, that is of little help for practical engineering. In this blog post, we take an in-depth look at the properties of singular stress fields and discuss some possible approaches. This is a follow-up to our blog post “Singularities in Finite Element Models: Dealing with Red Spots”, which describes when and why singular stresses appear in structural mechanics models. It offers a general introduction to singularities and is t ..read more

For thousands of years, people have observed the night sky, working to unravel the mysteries it beholds, decipher the stars, and map the cosmos. Today marks the birthday of a luminary astronomer who discovered multiple comets and star clusters and laid the foundation for the star catalog, which is still used by astronomers worldwide. Join us in exploring the life and legacy of Caroline Herschel. A Beginning in Music Caroline Lucretia Herschel was born on March 16, 1750, in Hanover, Germany. Her father encouraged all six of his children to study music and mathematics, ultimately inspiring a pas ..read more

The two-capacitor paradox is a provocative thought experiment set up to expose some of the limitations of electrical circuit modeling, and many different ways of resolving the paradox have been devised. I’ll add a solution to the mix that can be modeled in the COMSOL Multiphysics® software and then expand upon it to ask, and answer, an even more provocative question: Do capacitance and inductance exist? Let’s dive in! The Two-Capacitor Paradox This thought experiment is usually presented as: Consider a device composed of two equivalent capacitors, with capacitance, , connected in parallel ..read more

Convolution is a useful mathematical operation, applied in various fields for signal and image processing, statistics, and so on. Acoustic engineers often use convolution to process acoustic signals in order to extract the desired information or better interpret sound. In this blog post, we introduce three methods for performing convolution in the COMSOL Multiphysics® software. We will discuss implementing convolution by applying the methods to the low-pass filtering of a room impulse response (IR) and show one example of the auralization of room acoustics. Convolution: Definition and Met ..read more

HVAC systems do more than provide the smooth, chilled air that flows when the temperature outside rises. Within these systems, air moves through filters to ensure high air quality. With clean air at stake, modeling and simulation can be used to gain an in-depth understanding of the physics behind the behavior of air as it moves through a filter… Modeling an Air Filter The filters within HVAC systems rely on a material (often fiberglass or cotton folds) capable of straining the air and catching particulates like dust, pollen, and bacteria. These materials impact the flow of the air, catching th ..read more