3. Properties

3.1 Mechanical properties

In addition to the factors classically examined to understand a material's behavior under mechanical stress, i.e. elastic properties (nature of chemical bonding), crystalline structure and microstructure, in the case of foams we can add architectural characteristics: ligament structure, connectivity, porosity rate, surface curvature, dimensionality. The evolution of certain properties was evaluated by Gibson and Ashby, who proposed relationships known as scaling relations