Solid and Structural Mechanics Group
Marco Amato
Postdoctoral researcher
Marco was born in Bologna on 11 January 1993. He completed his education at the Istituto Tecnico per Geometri Pier-Crescenzi Pacinotti, a technical high school for surveyors, where he was first introduced to structural mechanics. He earned both a bachelor's and a master's degree in civil engineering from the University of Bologna. During his master's studies, he spent a research period as a visiting scholar at Florida Atlantic University in the United States. Marco also obtained a doctorate from the University of Trento and is currently working as a postdoctoral researcher at the Czech Technical University in Prague.
Research interests
His research interests are primarily situated within the field of solid and structural mechanics, with a focus on the complexities that arise when nonlinearity is involved. Within this area, he has concentrated his efforts on exploring configurational forces and the interactions between magnetic and elastic phenomena commonly referred to as magnetoelasticity. His work involves both the development of analytical models and the application of numerical simulations to verify these models, aiming to deepen the understanding of material responses and instabilities under multiphysics loading.
News:
June 2025
Marco presented his research titled Hard-magnetic soft materials: theory and implementation at the 1st HICOMP Conference - Hellenic-Italian Conference on Computational Mechanics, Biomechanics and Mechanics of Materials held in Rhodes Island, Greece. The conference provided an engaging platform to share recent advances and foster collaboration within the theoretical and computational mechanics community.
June 2025
In collaboration with Martin Horák, Marco is co-organizing the RAMSS 2025 Workshop on Recent Advances in the Mechanics of Soft Solids, to be held in Prague. The workshop will bring together researchers to discuss recent theoretical, computational, and experimental developments in the mechanics of soft materials.
April 2025
Marco’s PhD thesis, Elastic Solids Under Frictionless Rigid Contact and Configurational Force, has been selected as one of the finalists for the 2024 GMA-AIMETA Best Doctoral Thesis Award in Mechanics of Materials. While not the winner, being selected as one of the best national candidates is an honor and a recognition of his contributions to the study of configurational forces in nonlinear elasticity.