A note on incremental equations for a new class of constitutive relations for elastic bodies

Some new classes of constitutive relations for elastic bodies have been proposed in the literature, wherein the stresses and strains are obtained from implicit constitutive relations. A special case of the above relations corresponds to a class of constitutive equations where the linearized strain tensor is given as a nonlinear function of the stresses. For such constitutive equations we consider the problem of decomposing the stresses into two parts: one corresponds to a time-independent solution of the boundary value problem, plus a small (in comparison with the above) time-dependent stress tensor. The effect of this initial time-independent stress in the propagation of a small wave motion is studied for an infinite medium.     

Nonlinear elastic constitutive relations of residually stressed composites with stiff curved fibres

Applied Mathematics and Mechanics - Mechanical models of residually stressed fibre-reinforced solids, which do not resist bending, have been developed in the literature. However, in some residually...     

Macroscopic constitutive relations for elastomers reinforced with short aligned fibers: Instabilities and post-bifurcation response

This paper is concerned with the characterization of the macroscopic response and possible development of instabilities in a certain class of anisotropic composite materials consisting of random distributions of aligned rigid fibers of elliptical cross section in a soft elastomeric matrix, which are subjected to general plane strain loading conditions. For this purpose, use is made of an estimate for the stored-energy function that was derived by Lopez-Pamies and Ponte Castañeda (2006b) for this class of reinforced elastomers by means of the second-order linear comparison homogenization method. This homogenization estimate has been shown to lose strong ellipticity by the development of shear localization bands, when the composite is loaded in compression along the (in-plane) long axes of the fibers. The instability is produced by the sudden, collective rotation of a band of fibers to partially release the high stresses that develop in the elastomer matrix when the composite is compressed along the stiff, long-fiber direction. Consistent with the mode of the impending instability, a lower-energy, post-bifurcation solution is constructed where “striped domain” microstructures consisting of layers with alternating fiber orientations develop in the composite. The volume fractions of the layers and the fiber orientations within the layers adjust themselves to satisfy equilibrium and compatibility across the layers, while remaining compatible with the imposed overall deformation. Mathematically, this construction is shown to correspond to the rank-one convex envelope of the original estimate for the energy, and is further shown to be polyconvex and therefore quasiconvex. Thus, it corresponds to the “relaxation” of the stored-energy function of the composite, and can in turn be viewed as a stress-driven “phase transition,” where the symmetry of the fiber microstructures changes from nematic to smectic.     

On the symmetries of 2D elastic and hyperelastic tensors

A thorough investigation is made of the independent point-group symmetries and canonical matrix forms that the 2D elastic and hyperelastic tensors can have. Particular attention is paid to the concepts relevant to the proper definition of the independence of a symmetry from another one. It is shown that the numbers of all independent symmetries for the 2D elastic and hyperelastic tensors are six and four, respectively. In passing, a symmetry result useful for the homogenization theory of 2D linear elastic heterogeneous media is derived.     

On minimal representations for constitutive equations of anisotropic elastic materials

The problem of determining minimal representations for anisotropic elastic constitutive equations is proposed and investigated. For elastic constitutive equations in any given case of anisotropy, it is shown that there exist generating sets consisting of six generators and such generating sets are minimal in all possible generating sets. This fact implies that most of the established results for representations of elastic constitutive equations are not minimal and remain to be sharpened. For elastic constitutive equations in some cases of anisotropy, including orthotropy, transverse isotropy, the trigonal crystal class S ₆, and the classes C _2mh , m=1, 2, 3,..., etc., representations in terms of minimal generating sets are presented for the first time.     

Elasto-plastic constitutive relations of unidirectional fiber composites for cyclic loadings

The clasto-plastic constitutive behaviors of continuous fiber reinforced composites under cyclic loadings are studied by the micromechanics method in which the equal-strain model is used in the fiber direction, the equal-stress model in the other directions. It is supposed that fiber is linearly elastic and matrix is clastic-viscoplastic. The constitutive equations of the matrix are described by Bodner-Partom's unified constitutive theory. Boron/Aluminum composite, as an example, is investigated in detail for an understanding of the stress-strain relations and initial yield behaviors of metal matrix composites. Present results are compared with the experimental data.The project was supported by the Chinese National Natural Science Foundation.     

Exact relations for the anti-plane effective magneto-electro-elastic coefficients of two-phase fibrous composites

Two-phase fiber-reinforced magneto-electro-elastic composites are considered. The constituents exhibit transverse isotropy and the composite is assumed to have global monoclinic symmetry. The Milgrom–Shtrikman compatibility conditions are applied to obtain explicitly exact relations for the eighteen anti-plane effective coefficients. Such relations are written in terms of nine equalities of fourth-order determinants. These fourth-order determinants exhibit the regularity of a third-order minor formed by the response matrix of the matrix material and are completed by a row and/or column of the response matrices of the fibers material and the composite, respectively. Other two less explored alternative theories, namely, a second type of the Milgrom–Shtrikman conditions, which involve only effective coefficients, and Milgrom's version of the original Milgrom–Shtrikman conditions, are followed in order to derive twenty and forty exact relations, respectively. Particular and limit cases are recovered from the obtained relations.     

General invariant representations of the constitutive equations for isotropic nonlinearly elastic materials

This paper develops general invariant representations of the constitutive equations for isotropic nonlinearly elastic materials. Different sets of mutually orthogonal unit tensor bases are constructed from the strain argument tensor by using the representation theorem and corresponding irreducible invariants are defined. Their relations and geometrical interpretations are established in three dimensional principal space. It is shown that the constitutive law linking the stress and strain tensors is revealed to be a simple relationship between two vectors in the principal space. Relative to two different sets of the basis tensors, the constitutive equations are transformed according to the transformation rule of vectors. When a potential function is assumed to exist, the vector associated with the stress tensor is expressed in terms of its gradient with respect to the vector associated with the strain tensor. The Hill’s stability condition is shown to be that the scalar product of the increment of those two vectors must be positive. When potential function exists, it becomes to be that the 3 × 3 constitutive matrix derived from its second order derivative with respect to the vector associated with the strain must be positive definite. By decomposing the second order symmetric tensor space into the direct sum of a coaxial tensor subspace and another one orthogonal to it, the closed form representations for the fourth order tangent operator and its inversion are derived in an extremely simple way.     

The influence of the type of loading on the asymptotic behavior of slender elastic rings

We study the influence of the type of loading on the asymptotic behavior of linearly elastic, isotropic and homogeneous slender circular rings. By using formal asymptotic expansions, we obtain three families of models depending on the properties of the loads. If the loads expend work in inextensional displacements, then we find the classical model where the leading term of the energy corresponds to the bending-torsion energy of inextensional displacements. If the loads do no work in inextensional displacements, the model must be refined and we obtain two other types of models. In these other models, which depend on the type of loading, the leading term of the energy contains additional terms such as, for the second class, an extension energy due to the circumferential stretching of the ring, and even, for the third class, specific load-dependent contributions. This classification is illustrated in several examples.     

The Attainable Region of strain-invariant space for elastic materials

Within the theory of isothermal isotropic non-linear elasticity, the selection of the appropriate form for the strain energy function W in terms of the strain invariants is still an issue. The purpose of this paper is to introduce ideas and techniques which it is hoped will contribute to the task of finding an appropriate form for the strain energy. Three principal ideas are developed in this paper. Firstly, not all of invariant-space corresponds to real deformations. Constitutive equations only need to match real behaviour over a restricted part of invariant space, called the Attainable Region, bounded by states of deformation corresponding to uniaxial and equi-biaxial extension. Secondly, examples are given of how to exploit the fact that the Attainable Region is restricted. Mapping a deformation onto this region allows visualization of how close the deformation is to the well-understood uniaxial, equi-biaxial and simple shear deformations, and how this varies in space or time. Thirdly, acceptable strain invariants do not have to be obviously symmetric functions of the principal stretches. The ordered principal stretches are themselves invariants, and explicit unique algebraic expressions can be given through which the greatest, middle or least stretch can be calculated in terms of the usual invariants. Thus invariants can be chosen which are apparently non-symmetric functions of the ordered stretches.     

A numerical study of elastic bodies that are described by constitutive equations that exhibit limited strains

Recently, a very general and novel class of implicit bodies has been developed to describe the elastic response of solids. It contains as a special subclass the classical Cauchy and Green elastic bodies. Within the class of such bodies, one can obtain through a rigorous approximation, constitutive relations for the linearized strain as a nonlinear function of the stress. Such an approximation is not possible within classical theories of Cauchy and Green elasticity, where the process of linearization will only lead to the classical linearized elastic body.In this paper, we study numerically the states of stress and strain in a finite rectangular plate with an elliptic hole and a stepped flat tension bar with shoulder fillets, within the context of the new class of models for elastic bodies that guarantees that the linearized strain would stay bounded and limited below a value that can be fixed a priori, thereby guaranteeing the validity of the use of the model. This is in contrast to the classical linearized elastic model, wherein the strains can become large enough in the body leading to an obvious inconsistency.     

Some exact solutions for a class of compressible non-linearly elastic materials

In this paper we consider exact solutions for plane and axisymmetric deformations for a class of compressible elastic materials we call coharmonic. The coharmonic materials are derived from the harmonic materials by using Shield's inverse deformation theorem. The governing equations for the coharmonic material show the same kind of simplification associated with the harmonic materials. The equations reduce to first-order linear equations depending on an arbitrary harmonic function. They are intractable in general, so various ansätze are investigated. Boundary value problems for the coharmonic materials are compared with the same problems for harmonic materials. For certain boundary value problems, the harmonic materials exhibit well-known problematic behaviour which limits their use as models of material behaviour. The corresponding solutions for the coharmonic materials do not display these non-physical features.     

A micromechanical analysis of the nonlinear elastic and viscoelastic constitutive relation of a polymer filled with rigid particles

Micromechanical theory is applied to study the nonlinear elastic and viscoelastic constitutive relations of polymeric matrix filled with high rigidity solid particles. It is shown that Eshelby's method can be extended to the case of nonlinear matrix and Eshelby's tensor still exists provided that Poisson's ratio of the nonlinear matrix assumes constant value in deforming process and the rigidity of elastic filling particles is much higher than that of the matrix. A new method for averaging process is proposed to overcome the difficulty that occured in applying the ordinary equivalent inclusion method or the self-consistant method to nonlinear matrices. A rather simple constitutive equation is obtained finally and the strengthening effect of solid particles to composites is investigated. The work supported by the LNM, Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences and by the National Natural Science Foundation of China     

The Space of Inextensional Displacements for a Partially Clamped Linearly Elastic Shell with an Elliptic Middle Surface

We consider a linearly elastic shell with an “elliptic” middle surface, clamped along a portion of its lateral face and subjected to body forces. Under weak regularity assumptions on the middle surface, we prove that the space of linearized inextensional displacements is reduced to zero, by using unique continuation results. Consequently, when the thickness of the shell goes to zero, the limit of the average with respect to the thickness of the three-dimensional displacement vector solves the “generalized membrane” shell model, according to the terminology introduced by P.G. Ciarlet and the first author. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

A model-reduction approach in micromechanics of materials preserving the variational structure of constitutive relations

In 2003 the authors proposed a model-reduction technique, called the Nonuniform Transformation Field Analysis (NTFA), based on a decomposition of the local fields of internal variables on a reduced basis of modes, to analyze the effective response of composite materials. The present study extends and improves on this approach in different directions. It is first shown that when the constitutive relations of the constituents derive from two potentials, this structure is passed to the NTFA model. Another structure-preserving model, the hybrid NTFA model of Fritzen and Leuschner, is analyzed and found to differ (slightly) from the primal NTFA model (it does not exhibit the same variational upper bound character). To avoid the “on-line” computation of local fields required by the hybrid model, new reduced evolution equations for the reduced variables are proposed, based on an expansion to second order (TSO) of the potential of the hybrid model. The coarse dynamics can then be entirely expressed in terms of quantities which can be pre-computed once for all. Roughly speaking, these pre-computed quantities depend only on the average and fluctuations per phase of the modes and of the associated stress fields. The accuracy of the new NTFA-TSO model is assessed by comparison with full-field simulations. The acceleration provided by the new coarse dynamics over the full-field computations (and over the hybrid model) is then spectacular, larger by three orders of magnitude than the acceleration due to the sole reduction of unknowns.     

The use of a virtual configuration in formulating constitutive equations for residually stressed elastic materials

Residual stress is the stress present in the unloaded equilibrium configuration of a body. Because residual stresses can significantly affect the mechanical behavior of a component, the measurement of these stresses and the prediction of their effect on mechanical behavior are important objectives in many engineering problems. Common methods for the measurement of residual stresses include various destructive experiments in which the body is cut to relieve the residual stress. The resulting strain is measured and used to approximate the original residual stress in the intact body. In order to predict the mechanical behavior of a residually stressed body, a constitutive model is required that includes the influence of the residual stress.In this paper we present a method by which the data obtained from standard destructive experiments can be used to derive constitutive equations that describe the mechanical behavior of elastic residually stressed bodies. The derivation is based on the idea that for each infinitesimal neighborhood in a residually stressed body, there exists a corresponding stress free configuration. We refer to this stress free configuration as the virtual configuration of the infinitesimal neighborhood. The derivation requires that the constitutive equation for the stress free material be known and invertible; it is used to relate the residual stress to the deformation of the virtual configuration into the residually stressed configuration. Although the concept of the virtual configuration is central to the derivation, the geometry of this configuration need not be determined explicitly, and it need not be achievable experimentally, in order to construct the constitutive equation for the residually stressed body.The general mathematical forms of constitutive equations valid for residually stressed elastic materials have been derived previously for a number of cases. These general forms contain numerous unknown material-response functions or material constants that must be determined experimentally. In contrast, the method presented here results in a constitutive equation that is an explicit function of residual stress and includes only the material parameters required to describe the stress free material.After presenting the method for the derivation of constitutive equations, we explore the relationship between destructive experiments and the theory used in the derivation. Specifically, we discuss the use of the theory to improve the design of destructive experiments, and the use of destructive experiments to obtain the data required to construct the constitutive equation for a particular material.     

Three-dimensional constitutive relations for granular materials based on the dilatant double shearing mechanism and the concept of fabric

An extension of a three-dimensional model proposed by Anand and Gu (2000) for amorphous granular materials to include the effects of initial and induced anisotropy is presented in this paper. The proposed model can also be considered as a three-dimensional generalization of a model recently developed by Zhu et al. (2005) for the planar deformation of granular materials. The main ingredients of the model include the dilatant double shearing mechanism (Spencer, 1964, Mehrabadi and Cowin, 1978), the concept of fabric (Oda, 1972), and an extension of the Mohr–Coulomb yield criterion (Shield, 1955, Spencer, 1982) to three dimensions.The constitutive equations are implemented in the finite element program ABAQUS/Explicit (ABAQUS, 2001) by developing a user-material subroutine to conduct numerical triaxial compression tests for samples of granular materials with different initial anisotropy. The numerical results agree with the observed behavior and show that the extended constitutive model is capable of capturing the strength anisotropy of granular materials. Employing the anisotropic model developed here, we have also repeated the numerical simulation of the stress state in a static conical sand pile conducted earlier by Anand and Gu (2000). We find that fabric has little or no influence on the vertical stress distribution except at the base of the sand pile where the peak value of this stress is slightly higher than that predicted by the model of Anand and Gu (2000) which does not include the effects of fabric. We also find that the direction of the principal compressive stress changes from vertical at points away from the center of the pile to almost horizontal at points close to the center of the pile. This result provides a possible explanation for the observed dip in the vertical stress distribution in sand piles.     

Pre-stressed and reinforced hollow cylindrical mixture of non-linearly elastic solid and ideal fluid subjected to combined deformations: A study within the context of the theory of interacting continua

The theoretical result dealing with the saturation boundary condition, first investigated by [On boundary conditions for a certain class of problems in mixture theory, Int. J. Eng. Sci. 24 (1986) 1453-1463], has been recently extended by [On the saturation boundary condition within the context of the theory of interacting continua containing a certain distribution of fibers, Int. J. Eng. Sci. 41 (2003) 2273-2280] to the case of fibers-reinforced solid-ideal fluid mixture. Taking advantage of this new result, the problem of a hollow cylindrical mixture subjected to combined deformations, previously treated by Gandhi et al. [Some non-linear diffusion problems within the context of interacting continua, Int. J. Eng. Sci. 25 (1987) 1441-1457], is revisited in this contribution and improved by introducing the presence of fibers and residual stress (or pre-stress) characterized by the opening angle of the sector-like cross-section.     

Mindlin second-gradient elastic properties from dilute two-phase Cauchy-elastic composites. Part I: Closed form expression for the effective higher-order constitutive tensor

It is shown that second-order homogenization of a Cauchy-elastic dilute suspension of randomly distributed inclusions yields an equivalent second gradient (Mindlin) elastic material. This result is valid for both plane and three-dimensional problems and extends earlier findings by Bigoni and Drugan [Bigoni, D., Drugan, W.J., 2007. Analytical derivation of Cosserat moduli via homogenization of heterogeneous elastic materials. J. Appl. Mech. 74, 741–753] from several points of view: (i) the result holds for anisotropic phases with spherical or circular ellipsoid of inertia; (ii) the displacement boundary conditions considered in the homogenization procedure is independent of the characteristics of the material; (iii) a perfect energy match is found between heterogeneous and equivalent materials (instead of an optimal bound). The constitutive higher-order tensor defining the equivalent Mindlin solid is given in a surprisingly simple formula. Applications, treatment of material symmetries and positive definiteness of the effective higher-order constitutive tensor are deferred to Part II of the present article.     

A generalized constitutive elasticity law for GLPD micromorphic materials,with application to the problem of a spherical shell subjected to axisymmetric loading conditions

In this work we propose to replace the GLPD hypo-elasticity law by a more rigorous generalized Hooke's law based on classical material symmetry characterization assumptions. This law introduces in addition to the two well-known Lame's moduli, five constitutive constants. An analytical solution is derived for the problem of a spherical shell subjected to axisymmetric loading conditions to illustrate the potential of the proposed generalized Hooke's law.