Finite Third-order Gradient Elasticity and Thermoelasticity

A constitutive format for the third-order gradient elasticity is suggested. It includes both isotropic and anisotropic non-linear behavior under finite deformations. Appropriate invariant stress and strain variables are introduced, which allow for reduced forms of the elastic energy law that identically fulfill the objectivity requirement. After working out the transformation behavior under a change of the reference placement, the symmetry transformations for third-order materials can be introduced. After the mechanical third-order theory, an extension to thermoelasticity is given, and necessary and sufficient conditions are derived from the Clausius-Duhem inequality.     

Orthotropic elastic–plastic material model for paper materials

Paper and paperboard generally exhibit anisotropic and non-linear mechanical material behaviour. In this work, the development of an orthotropic elastic–plastic constitutive model, suitable for modelling of the material behaviour of paper is presented. The anisotropic material behaviour is introduced into the model by orthotropic elasticity and an isotropic plasticity equivalent transformation tensor. A parabolic stress–strain relation is adopted to describe the hardening of the material. The experimental and numerical procedures for evaluation of the required material parameters for the model are described. Uniaxial tensile testing in three different inplane material directions provides the calibration of the material parameters under plane stress conditions. The numerical implementation of the material model is presented and the model is shown to perform well in agreement with experimentally observed mechanical behaviour of paper.     

On the role of symmetry in Saint-Venant’s problem

In the relaxed Saint-Venant’s elastic problem, in virtue of Saint-Venant’s Postulate, the pointwise assignments of tractions at cylinder plane ends are replaced by the assignments of the corresponding resultant forces and moments. The solution indeterminacy so introduced is traditionally overcome by postulating that some specific features characterize the elastic state. In this work a relaxed incremental equilibrium problem is posed for a heterogenous anisotropic cylinder, whose tangent elasticity tensor field possesses the usual major and minor symmetries, is positive definite, independent from the axial coordinate and endowed with a plane of elastic symmetry orthogonal to the cylinder axis. Symmetry has been consistently employed to formulate the basic problems of extension, bending, torsion and flexure as symmetric and antisymmetric problems respectively. It is shown that Saint-Venant’s postulate, momentum balance and symmetry are sufficient, without resorting to any a priori assumption, to determine the general form of the displacement field and to remove the solution indeterminacy.     

Cascade unlooping of a low-pitch helical spring under tension

We study the force vs. extension behaviour of a helical spring made of a thin torsionally stiff anisotropic elastic rod. Our focus is on springs of very low helical pitch. For certain parameters of the problem such a spring is found not to unwind when pulled but rather to form hockles that pop out one by one and lead to a highly non-monotonic force-extension curve. Between abrupt loop pop-outs this curve is well described by the planar elastica whose relevant solutions are classified. Our results may be relevant for tightly coiled nanosprings in future micro- and nano(electro)mechanical devices.     

Crack trajectories influenced by mechanical and thermal disturbance in anisotropic material

This work is concerned with the application of the volume energy density criterion for predicting the crack trajectories as influenced by mechanical and thermal disturbance in an anisotropic material. Two-dimensional linear thermoelasticity is employed in conjunction with the well-known complex potentials such that a linear relationship is obtained for the boundary conditions across the crack or line of discontinuity. Boundary collocation is then used to determine the unknown coefficients from which the contours of the volume energy density in the cracked plate can be obtained. The crack path is assumed to coincide with the loci where dilatation would dominate. This corresponds to the locations of relative minimum energy density which can be found by visual inspection. An equal and opposite mechanical stress and thermal gradient are applied on the cracked plate. The former and latter enhance symmetric and asymmetric crack growth, respectively. They would complete depending on the magnitude of the mechanical and thermal load. Numerical results are presented for three (3) different cases of a plate whose principal axes of material symmetry are tilted to the crack plane. The influence of anisotropy on crack path is found to be secondary.     

Closed form solution for a nonlocal elastic bar in tension

A simple mechanical one-dimensional problem in the context of nonlocal (integral) elasticity is solved analytically. The nonlocal elastic material behaviour is described by the “Eringen model” whose nonlocality features all reside in the constitutive relation. This relation, of integral type, contains an attenuation function (usually assumed symmetric) aimed to capture the diffusion process of the nonlocality effects; it also exhibits a convolution format. The governing equation is a Fredholm integral equation of second kind whose analytical treatment, even for the usual choice of a symmetric kernel, is not easy to develop. In the present paper, assuming a specific shape for the attenuation function, a closed form solution in terms of strains is alternatively obtained by solving a Volterra integral equation of second kind. The latter can be easily solved with standard techniques, at least for the adopted kernel, taking also advantage from the symmetry of the solution. Such a closed form solution is an essential result to validate the effectiveness of numerical procedures aimed to solve more complex mechanical problems in the context of nonlocal elasticity.     

An energy-based damage model of geomaterials—I. Formulation and numerical results

In this paper, an anisotropic damage model is established in strain space to describe the behaviour of geomaterials under compression-dominated stress fields. The research work focuses on rate-independent and small-deformation behaviour during isothermal processes. It is emphasized that the damage variables should be defined microstructurally rather than phenomenologically for geomaterials, and a second-order fabric tensor is chosen as the damage variable. Starting from it, a one-parameter damage-dependent elasticity tensor is deduced based on tensorial algebra and thermodynamic requirements ; a fourth-order damage characteristic tensor, which determines anisotropic damaging, is deduced within the framework of Rice, 1971 normality structure in Part II of this paper. An equivalent state is developed to exclude the macroscopic stress⧹strain explicitly from the relevant constitutive equations. Finally, some numerical results are worked out to illustrate the mechanical behaviour of this model.     

Bounds on the Effective Anisotropic Elastic Constants

Hill [12] showed that it was possible to construct bounds on the effective isotropic elastic coefficients of a material with triclinic or greater symmetry. Hill noted that the triclinic symmetry coefficients appearing in the bounds could be specialized to those of a greater symmetry, yielding the effective isotropic elastic coefficients for a material with any elastic symmetry. It is shown here that it is possible to construct bounds on the effective elastic constants of a material with any anisotropic elastic symmetry in terms of triclinic symmetry elastic coefficients. Similarly, it is then possible to specialize the triclinic symmetry coefficients appearing in the bounds to those of a greater symmetry. Specific bounds are given for the effective elastic coefficients of cubic, hexagonal, tetragonal and trigonal symmetries in terms of the elastic coefficients of triclinic symmetry. These results are obtained by combining the approach of Hill [12] with a representation of the stress-strain relations due, in principle, to Kelvin [25,26] but recast in the structure of contemporary linear algebra. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.