• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.1333-1354
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• 2015

A higher order analytical solution for static analysis of a truncated conical composite sandwich panel subjected to different loading conditions was presented in this paper which was based on a new improved higher order sandwich panel theory. Bending analysis of sandwich structures with flexible cores subjected to concentrated load, uniform distributed load on a patch, harmonic and uniform distributed loads on the top and/or bottom face sheet of the sandwich structure was also investigated. For the first time, bending analysis of truncated conical composite sandwich panels with flexible cores was performed. The governing equations were derived by principle of minimum potential energy. The first order shear deformation theory was used for the composite face sheets and for the core while assuming a polynomial description of the displacement fields. Also, the in-plane hoop stresses of the core were considered. In order to assure accuracy of the present formulations, convergence of the results was examined. Effects of types of boundary conditions, types of applied loads, conical angles and fiber angles on bending analysis of truncated conical composite sandwich panels were studied. As, there is no research on higher order bending analysis of conical sandwich panels with flexible cores, the results were validated by ABAQUS FE code. The present approach can be linked with the standard optimization programs and it can be used in the iteration process of the structural optimization. The proposed approach facilitates investigation of the effect of physical and geometrical parameters on the bending response of sandwich composite structures.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.10 no.6
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• pp.1429-1449
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• 2016

The effect of porosity on bending and free vibration behavior of simply supported functionally graded plate reposed on the Winkler-Pasternak foundation is investigated analytically in the present paper. The modified rule of mixture covering porosity phases is used to describe and approximate material properties of the FGM plates with porosity phases. The effect due to transverse shear is included by using a new refined shear deformation theory. The number of unknown functions involved in the present theory is only four as against five or more in case of other shear deformation theories. The Poisson ratio is held constant. Based on the sinusoidal shear deformation theory, the position of neutral surface is determined and the equation of motion for FG rectangular plates resting on elastic foundation based on neutral surface is obtained through the minimum total potential energy and Hamilton's principle. The convergence of the method is demonstrated and to validate the results, comparisons are made with the available solutions for both isotropic and functionally graded material (FGM). The effect of porosity volume fraction on Al/Al2O3 and Ti-6Al-4V/Aluminum oxide plates are presented in graphical forms. The roles played by the constituent volume fraction index, the foundation stiffness parameters and the geometry of the plate is also studied.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.3 no.2_3
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• pp.103-122
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• 2006

Drying shrinkage of concrete occurs due to the loss of moisture and thus, it is controlled by moisture diffusion process. On the other hand, the shrinkage causes cracking of concrete and affects its moisture diffusion properties. Therefore, moisture diffusion and drying shrinkage are two coupled processes and their interactive effect is important for the durability of concrete structures. In this paper, the two material parameters in the moisture diffusion equation, i.e., the moisture capacity and humidity diffusivity, are modified by two different methods to include the effect of drying shrinkage on the moisture diffusion. The effect of drying shrinkage on the humidity diffusivity is introduced by the scalar damage parameter. The effect of drying shrinkage on the moisture capacity is evaluated by an analytical model based on non-equilibrium thermodynamics and minimum potential energy principle for a two-phase composite. The mechanical part of drying shrinkage is modeled as an elastoplastic damage problem. The coupled problem of moisture diffusion and drying shrinkage is solved using a finite element method. The present model can predict that the drying shrinkage accelerates the moisture diffusion in concrete, and in turn, the accelerated drying process increases the shrinkage strain. The coupling effects are demonstrated by a numerical example.

• Advances in Computational Design
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.165-190
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• 2018

In this article, the static behavior of non-prismatic sandwich beams composed of functionally graded (FG) materials is investigated for the first time. Two types of beams in which the variation of elastic modulus follows a power-law form are studied. The principle of minimum total potential energy is applied along with the Ritz method to derive and solve the governing equations. Considering conventional boundary conditions, Chebyshev polynomials of the first kind are used as auxiliary shape functions. The formulation is developed within the framework of well-known Timoshenko and Reddy beam theories (TBT, RBT). Since the beams are simultaneously tapered and functionally graded, bending and shear stress pushover curves are presented to get a profound insight into the variation of stresses along the beam. The proposed formulations and solution scheme are verified through benchmark problems. In this context, excellent agreement is observed. Numerical results are included considering beams with various cross sectional types to inspect the effects of taper ratio and gradient index on deflections and stresses. It is observed that the boundary conditions, taper ratio, gradient index value and core to the thickness ratio significantly influence the stress and deflection responses.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.75 no.6
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• pp.737-746
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• 2020

This paper attempts to investigate the free vibration of functionally graded material beams with nonuniform width based on the nonlocal elasticity theory. The theoretical formulations are established following the Euler-Bernoulli beam theory, and the governing equations of motion of the system are derived from the minimum total potential energy principle using the nonlocal elasticity theory. In addition, the Differential Quadrature Method (DQM) is applied, along with the Chebyshev-Gauss-Lobatto polynomials, in order to determine the weighting coefficient matrices. Furthermore, the effects of the nonlocal parameter, cross-section area of the functionally graded material (FGM) beam and various boundary conditions on the natural frequencies are examined. It is observed that the nonlocal parameter and boundary conditions significantly influence the natural frequencies of the functionally graded material beam cross-section. The results obtained, using the Differential Quadrature Method (DQM) under various boundary conditions, are found in good agreement with analytical and numerical results available in the literature.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.227-239
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• 2020

The aim of this study is to obtain the nonlinear and post-buckling responses of relatively thick functionally graded plates with oblique elliptical cutouts using a new semi-analytical approach. To model the oblique elliptical hole in a FGM plate, six plate-elements are used and the connection between these elements is provided by the well-known Penalty method. Therefore, the semi-analytical technique used in this paper is known as the plate assembly technique. In order to take into account for functionality of the material in a perforated plate, the volume fraction of the material constituents follows a simple power law distribution. Since the FGM perforated plates are relatively thick in this research, the structural model is assumed to be the first order shear deformation theory and Von-Karman's assumptions are used to incorporate geometric nonlinearity. The equilibrium equations for FGM plates containing elliptical holes are obtained by the principle of minimum of total potential energy. The obtained nonlinear equilibrium equations are solved numerically using the quadratic extrapolation technique. Various sets of boundary conditions for FGM plates and different cutout sizes and orientations are assumed here and their effects on nonlinear response of plates under compressive loads are examined.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.337-357
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• 2000

Analytical formulations and solutions for the first time, to the stability analysis of a simply supported composite and sandwich plates based on a higher order refined theory, developed by the first author and already reported in the literature are presented. The theoretical model presented herein incorporates laminate deformations which account for the effects of transverse shear deformation, transverse normal strain/stress and a nonlinear variation of inplane displacements with respect to the thickness coordinate - thus modelling the warping of transverse cross sections more accurately and eliminating the need for shear correction coefficients. The equations of equilibrium are obtained using the Principle of Minimum Potential Energy (PMPE). The comparison of the results using this higher order refined theory with the available elasticity solutions and the results computed independently using the first order and the other higher order theories developed by other investigators and available in the literature shows that this refined theory predicts the critical buckling load more accurately than all other theories considered in this paper. New results for sandwich laminates are also presented which may serve as a benchmark for future investigations.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.13 no.3
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• pp.385-410
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• 2017

This work presents a simple and refined nth-order shear deformation theory for mechanical and thermal buckling behaviors of functionally graded (FG) plates resting on elastic foundation. The proposed refined nth-order shear deformation theory has a new displacement field which includes undetermined integral terms and contains only four unknowns. Governing equations are obtained from the principle of minimum total potential energy. A Navier type analytical solution methodology is also presented for simply supported FG plates resting on elastic foundation which predicts accurate solution. The accuracy of the present model is checked by comparing the computed results with those obtained by classical plate theory (CPT), first-order shear deformation theory (FSDT) and higher-order shear deformation theory (HSDT). Moreover, results demonstrate that the proposed theory can achieve the same accuracy of the existing HSDTs which have more number of variables.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.32 no.5
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• pp.657-670
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• 2019

This paper proposes a one-dimensional fiber beam element model taking account of materially non-linear behavior, benefiting the highly efficient elastic-plastic analysis of girders with shear-lag effects. Based on the displacement-based fiber beam-column element, two additional degrees of freedom (DOFs) are added into the proposed model to consider the shear-lag warping deformations of the slabs. The new finite element (FE) formulations of the tangent stiffness matrix and resisting force vector are deduced with the variational principle of the minimum potential energy. Then the proposed element is implemented in the OpenSees computational framework as a newly developed element, and the full Newton iteration method is adopted for an iterative solution. The typical materially non-linear behaviors, including the cracking and crushing of concrete, as well as the plasticity of the reinforcement and steel girder, are all considered in the model. The proposed model is applied to several test cases under elastic or plastic loading states and compared with the solutions of theoretical models, tests, and shell/solid refined FE models. The results of these comparisons indicate the accuracy and applicability of the proposed model for the analysis of both concrete box girders and steel-concrete composite girders, under either elastic or plastic states.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.185-192
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• 2019

In this paper, the buckling of micro sandwich hollow circular plate is investigated with the consideration of the porous core and piezoelectric layer reinforced by functionally graded (FG)carbon nano-tube. For modeling the displacement field of sandwich hollow circular plate, the high-order shear deformation theory (HSDT) of plate and modified couple stress theory (MCST) are used. The governing differential equations of the system can be derived using the principle of minimum potential energy and Maxwell's equation that for solving these equations, the Ritz method is employed. The results of this research indicate the influence of various parameters such as porous coefficients, small length scale parameter, distribution of carbon nano-tube in piezoelectric layers and temperature on critical buckling load. The purpose of this research is to show the effect of physical parameters on the critical buckling load of micro sandwich plate and then optimize these parameters to design structures with the best efficiency. The results of this research can be used for optimization of micro-structures and manufacturing different structure in aircraft and aerospace.