Maria Bayard Dühring - Solid Mechanics

Preface
This thesis is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for obtaining the
degree of Ph.D. in mechanical engineering at the Technical University of Denmark
(DTU). The Ph.D. project was funded by DTU and carried out at the Department
of Mechanical Engineering, Solid Mechanics, at DTU in the period February 1 st 2006
- July 31 st 2009. Supervisors on the project were Professor Dr.techn. Ole Sigmund
and Associate Professor Ph.D. Jakob Søndergaard Jensen from the department.
I am very grateful to my two supervisors for their inspiring support and for
always taking their time to discuss the work and the results during the project. I
would also like to thank Martin P. Bendsøe, who was my co-supervisor until January
1 st 2009, for our beneficial collaboration.
I would like to express my gratitude to the partners from the joint research group
Photonic Switches and Modulators based on Surface Acoustic Waves of ePIXnet - the
European Network of Excellence on Photonic Integrated Components and Circuits
Paulo V. Santos and Markus Beck from Paul-Drude-Institut für Festkörperelektronik,
Berlin, Germany, and Mike van der Poel, Elaine C. Saraiva Barretto and Peter
De Heyn from Department of Photonics Engineering, DTU, for the successful collaboration
and for the help to understand the experimental aspects related to my
theoretical work.
A part of this work was carried out with Vincent Laude and Abdelkrim Khelif at
Institute FEMTO-ST, Besançon, France, during my 5 month stay in autumn 2007
and winter 2008. I am very grateful that the stay was made possible and for the new
academic input in a friendly and welcoming atmosphere. During my 6 months leave
in the spring 2008 I worked with Thomas Feurer at the Institute of Applied Physics,
University of Bern, Switzerland, and would like to thank him for his support and
inspiration related to the work about photonic-crystal fibers.
I am thankful to Krister Svanberg at Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden,
who has granted me permission to use the MMA-code. The support form the
Eurohorcs/ESF European Young Investigator Award (EURYI, www.esf.org/euryi)
through the grant ”Synthesis and topology optimization of optomechanical systems”
and from the Danish Center for Scientific Computing is also gratefully acknowledged.
I finally wish to thank my colleagues in the TopOpt Group, at the section of
Solid Mechanics and in particular the other phd-students for creating a cheerful and
inspiring working environment.
Kgs. Lyngby, July 31 st 2009.
Maria Bayard Dühring
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