• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제62권6호
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• pp.749-758
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• 2017

In structural mechanics, traditional analyses methods usually employ matrix operations for obtaining displacement and internal forces of the structure under the external effects, such as distributed loads, earthquake or wind excitations, and temperature changing inter alia. These matrices are derived from the well-known principle of mechanics called minimum potential energy. According to this principle, a system can be in the equilibrium state only in case when the total potential energy of system is minimum. A close examination of the expression of the well-known equilibrium condition for linear problems, $P=K{\Delta}$, where P is the load vector, K is the stiffness matrix and ${\Delta}$ is the displacement vector, it is seen that, basically this principle searches the displacement set (or deformed shape) for a system that minimizes the total potential energy of it. Instead of using mathematical operations used in the conventional methods, with a different formulation, meta-heuristic algorithms can also be used for solving this minimization problem by defining total potential energy as objective function and displacements as design variables. Based on this idea the technique called Total Potential Optimization using Meta-heuristic Algorithms (TPO/MA) is proposed. The method has been successfully applied for linear and non-linear analyses of trusses and truss-like structures, and the results have shown that the approach is much more successful than conventional methods, especially for analyses of non-linear systems. In this study, the application of TPO/MA, with Harmony Search as the selected meta-heuristic algorithm, to cables net system is presented. The results have shown that the method is robust, powerful and accurate.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제76권1호
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• pp.27-56
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• 2020

In this paper, the deflection and buckling analyses of porous nano-composite piezoelectric plate reinforced by carbon nanotube (CNT) are studied. The equations of equilibrium using energy method are derived from principle of minimum total potential energy. In the research, the non-local strain gradient theory is employed to consider size dependent effect for porous nanocomposite piezoelectric plate. The effects of material length scale parameter, Eringen's nonlocal parameter, porosity coefficient and aspect ratio on the deflection and critical buckling load are investigated. The results indicate that the effect of porosity coefficient on the increase of the deflection and critical buckling load is greatly higher than the other parameters effect, and size effect including nonlocal parameter and the material length scale parameter have a lower effect on the deflection increase with respect to the porosity coefficient, respectively and vice versa for critical buckling load. Porous nanocomposites are used in various engineering fields such as aerospace, medical industries and water refinery.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제13권3호
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• pp.261-276
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• 2002

A novel, 6-node, two-dimensional mixed finite element (FE) model has been developed to analyze laminated composite beams by using the minimum potential energy principle. The model has been formulated by considering four degrees of freedom (two displacement components u, w and two transverse stress components ${\sigma}_z$, $\tau_{xz}$) per node. The transverse stress components have been invoked as nodal degrees of freedom by using the fundamental elasticity equations. Thus, the present mixed finite element model not only ensures the continuity of transverse stress and displacement fields through the thickness of the laminated beams but also maintains the fundamental elasticity relationship between the components of stress, strain and displacement fields throughout the elastic continuum. This is an important feature of the present formulation, which has not been observed in various mixed formulations available in the literature. Results obtained from the model have been shown to be in excellent agreement with the elasticity solutions for thin as well as thick laminated composite beams. A few results for a cross-ply beam under fixed support conditions are also presented.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제89권6호
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• pp.571-578
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• 2024

The bistable thin cylindrical shell is developable structure with the ability to transition between its two stable configurations. This structure offers significant potential applications due to its excellent deformability. In this paper, the composite thin cylindrical shell consisting of the composite layer and the piezoelectric layer was investigated. The material and geometric parameters of the shell were found to influence its stable characteristics. The analysis model of the composite thin cylindrical shell incorporating the piezoelectric layer was developed, and the expressions for its strain energy were derived. By applying the minimum energy principle, the impact of the electric field intensity on the bi-stable behaviors of the cylindrical shell was analyzed. The results showed that the shell exhibited the bistability only under the appropriate electric field strength. And the accuracy of the theoretical prediction was verified by simulation experiments. This study provides an important reference for the application of deployable structures.

• 한국강구조학회 논문집
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• 제8권3호통권28호
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• pp.55-65
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• 1996

For stability analysis of stifened rectangular thin plates with various boundary conditions, Ritz method is presented. An energy method is especially useful in those cases where a rigorous solution of the diferential eqution is unknown or where we have a plate reinforced by stiffeners and it is required to find only an approximate value of the critical load. The strain energy due to the plate bending and the work done by the in-plane forces are taken into account in order to apply the principle of the minimum potential energy. The buckling mode shapes of flexural beams with various boundary conditions are derived, and shape functions consistent with the given boundary conditions in the two orthogonal directions are chosen from those displacement functions of beams. The matrix equations for stability of stiffened rectangular thin plates are determined from the stationary condition of the total potential energy. Numerical example for stability behaviors of horizontally and vertically stiffened plates subjected to uniform compression, bending and shear loadings are presented and the obtained results are compared with other researchers' results.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제68권3호
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• pp.377-384
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• 2018

Bi-stable structure can be stable in both its extended and coiled forms. For the un-stressed thin cylindrical shell, the strain energy expressions are deduced by using a theoretical model in terms of only two parameters. Based on the principle of minimum potential energy, the bi-stable behaviors of the cylindrical shells are investigated. The results indicate that the isotropic cylindrical shell does not have the second stable configuration and laminated cylindrical shells with symmetric or antisymmetric layup of fibers have the second stable state under some confined conditions. In the case of antisymmetric laminated cylindrical shell, the analytical expressions of the stability are derived based on the extremal principle, and the shell can achieve a compact coiled configuration without twist deformation in its second stable state. In the case of symmetric laminated cylindrical shell, the explicit solutions for the stability conditions cannot be deduced. Numerical results show that stable configuration of symmetric shell is difficult to achieve and symmetric shell has twist deformation in its second stable form. In addition, the roll-up radii of the antisymmetric laminated cylindrical shells are calculated using the finite element package ABAQUS. The results show that the value of the roll-up radii is larger from FE simulation than from theoretical analysis. By and large, the predicted roll-up radii of the cylindrical shells using ABAQUS agree well with the theoretical results.

• 대한조선학회지
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• 제24권1호
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• pp.42-50
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• 1987

The energy expressions are formulated for the axially stiffened shell treating the stiffeners as discrete elements. The principle of minimum potential energy is employed to formulate the buckling equations for a simply supported, axially stiffened shell under uniform axial compression. The displacement functions are expended into double trigonometric series. The mode assuming method employed in this paper makes it possible to reduce the matrix size of the eigenvalue problem considerably. Effects are made to investigate the transition from overall buckling to local buckling and to verify the existence of the minimum stiffness ratio of stiffener as in the case of stiffened plate. The results of the calculation show that the critical stiffener size increase linearly as the length of the shell increases. The results also show that the overall buckling load decreases and the local buckling load has a nearly constant value as the length of the shell increases. The results show very good agreements with other computational available.

• 한국콘크리트학회:학술대회논문집
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• 한국콘크리트학회 2002년도 봄 학술발표회 논문집
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• pp.303-308
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• 2002

A governing differential equation (GDE) of PSC flexural member with constant eccentricity considering the long-term losses including concrete creep, shrinkage, and PS steel relaxation is derived based on the two approaches. The first approach utilizes the force and moment equilibrium equations derived based on the geometry of strains of the uniform and curvature strains while the second one utilizes the principle of minimum total potential energy formulation. The identity of the two GDE's is verified by comparing the coefficients consisting of the GDE's. The boundary conditions resulting from the functional analysis of the variational calculus are investigated. Rayleigh-Ritz method provides a way to get the explicit form of the continuous deflection function in which the total potential energy is minimized with respect to the unknown coefficients consisting of the trial functions. As a closure, the analytically calculated results are compared with the experiments and show good agreements.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제63권4호
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• pp.481-495
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• 2017

The present article examines the static response of multilayered magneto-electro-elastic (MEE) beam in thermal environment through finite element (FE) methods. On the basis of the minimum total potential energy principle and the coupled constitutive equations of MEE material, the FE equilibrium equations of cantilever MEE beam is derived. Maxwell's equations are considered to establish the relation between electric field and electric potential; magnetic field and magnetic potential. A simple condensation approach is employed to solve the global FE equilibrium equations. Further, numerical evaluations are made to examine the influence of different in-plane and through-thickness temperature distributions on the multiphysics response of MEE beam. A parametric study is performed to evaluate the effect of stacking sequence and different temperature profiles on the direct and derived quantities of MEE beam. It is believed that the results presented in this article serve as a benchmark for accurate design and analysis of the MEE smart structures in thermal applications.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• 제45권2호
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• pp.183-199
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• 2013

Current methods of analysis of trusses depend on matrix formulations based on equilibrium equations which are in fact derived from energy principles, and compatibility conditions. Recently it has been shown that the minimum energy principle, by itself, in its pure and unmodified form, can well be exploited to analyze structures when coupled with an optimization algorithm, specifically with a meta-heuristic algorithm. The resulting technique that can be called Total Potential Optimization using Meta-heuristic Algorithms (TPO/MA) has already been applied to analyses of linear and nonlinear plane trusses successfully as coupled with simulated annealing and local search algorithms. In this study the technique is applied to both 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional trusses emphasizing robustness, reliability and accuracy. The trials have shown that the technique is robust in two senses: all runs result in answers, and all answers are acceptable as to the reliability and accuracy within the prescribed limits. It has also been shown that Harmony Search presents itself as an appropriate algorithm for the purpose.