Weak,anisotropic symmetric formulations of Biot's equations for vibro‐acoustic modelling of porous elastic materials

In this paper a fully anisotropic symmetric weak formulation of Biot's equations for vibro‐acoustic modelling of porous elastic materials in the frequency domain is proposed. Starting from Biot's equations in their anisotropic form, a mixed displacement–pressure formulation is discussed in terms of Cartesian tensors. The anisotropic equation parameters appearing in the differential equations are derived from material parameters which are possible to determine through experimental testing or micro‐structural simulations of the fluid and the porous skeleton. Solutions are obtained by applying the finite element method to the proposed weak form and the results are verified against a weak displacement‐based formulation for a foam and plate combination. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An energy-stable mixed formulation for isogeometric analysis of incompressible hyperelastodynamics

We develop a mixed formulation for incompressible hyperelastodynamics based on a continuum modeling framework recently developed in the work of Liu and Marsden and smooth generalizations of the Taylor-Hood element based on nonuniform rational B-splines (NURBSs). This continuum formulation draws a link between computational fluid dynamics and computational solid dynamics. This link inspires an energy stability estimate for the spatial discretization, which favorably distinguishes the formulation from the conventional mixed formulations for finite elasticity. The inf-sup condition is utilized to provide a bound for the pressure field. The generalized-α method is applied for temporal discretization, and a nested block preconditioner is invoked for the solution procedure. The inf-sup stability for different pairs of NURBS elements is elucidated through numerical assessment. The convergence rate of the proposed formulation with various combinations of mixed elements is examined by the manufactured solution method. The numerical scheme is also examined under compressive and tensile loads for isotropic and anisotropic hyperelastic materials. Finally, a suite of dynamic problems is numerically studied to corroborate the stability and conservation properties.     

Mixed mode fracture analysis of rectilinear anisotropic plates by high order finite elements

A singular finite element is developed for direct calculation of combined modes I and II stress intensity factors for planar rectilinear anisotropic structures subject to arbitrary loading. Twelve-node conventional elements are used in conjunction with a linear elastic fracture mechanics enrichment of the same element which is formed into a four-element macro-element. Example problems show this formulation to be exceptionally accurate and results are presented for a variety of modern fibre-reinforced composites in simple mode I extension and in mixed mode I and II situations. In addition, it is shown that the meshes for accurate results are relatively coarse and thus calculations are quite economical.     

On the enhancement of low‐order mixed finite element methods for the large deformation analysis of diffusion in solids

A stabilized scheme is developed for mixed finite element methods for strongly coupled diffusion problems in solids capable of large deformations. Enhanced assumed strain techniques are employed to cure spurious oscillation patterns of low‐order displacement/pressure mixed formulations in the incompressible limit for quadrilateral elements and brick elements. A study is presented that shows how hourglass instabilities resulting from geometrically nonlinear enhanced assumed strain methods have to be distinguished from pressure oscillation patterns due to the violation of the inf‐sup condition. Moreover, an element formulation is proposed that provides stable results with respect to both types of instabilities. Comparisons are drawn between material models for incompressible solids of Mooney–Rivlin type and models for standard diffusion in solids with incompressible matrices such as polymeric gels. Representative numerical examples underline the ability of the proposed element formulation to cure instabilities of low‐order mixed formulations. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A finite element formulation for highly anisotropic incompressible elastic solids

A numerical approach is developed for the solution of problems of materials with extremely strong directions. Small deformations of a transversely isotropic linear elastic solid, reinforced by a single family of inextensible fibres, are considered. The kinematic constraint equations of incompressibility and inextensibility in the fibre direction lead to the appearance of an arbitrary hydrostatic pressure and an arbitrary tension stress in the constitutive equations. A Galerkin approach is used to discretize the virtual work and weak form of the constraint equations. Independent interpolation of the displacement, pressure and tension fields leads to a mixed system of equations, with characteristic zero-diagonal terms. The assumption of plane stress conditions in the plane of the fibres results in a simplified displacement-tension formulation, analogous to the primitive-variable formulation of Stokes flow. A mixed penalty approximation is then employed to solve for displacement and tension stress fields. Computations are carried out using a biquadratic displacement element with discontinuous bilinear tension stress interpolation. The formulation is used to solve a number of simple beam problems and the results compared to closed-form solutions.     

P1‐nonconforming quadrilateral finite element for topology optimization

This investigation focuses on an alternative approach to topology optimization problems involving incompressible materials using the P1‐nonconforming finite element. Instead of using the mixed displacement‐pressure formulation, a pure displacement‐based approach can be employed for finite element formulation owing to the Poisson locking‐free property of the P1‐nonconforming element. Moreover, because the P1‐nonconforming element has linear shape functions that are defined at element vertices, it has considerably fewer degrees of freedom than other quadrilateral nonconforming elements and its implementation is as simple as that of the conforming bilinear element. Various problems dealing with incompressible materials and pressure‐loaded structures found in published works are solved to verify the applicability of the proposed method. The application of the method is extended to the optimal design of fluid channels in the Stokes flow. This is done by expressing pressure in terms of volumetric strain rates and developing a velocity‐field‐only finite element formulation. The optimization results obtained from all the problems considered in this study are in close agreement with those found in the literature. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Mixed finite element method for saturated poroelastoplastic media at large strains

A mixed finite element for hydro‐dynamic analysis in saturated porous media in the frame of the Biot theory is proposed. Displacements, effective stresses, strains for the solid phase and pressure, pressure gradients, and Darcy velocities for the fluid phase are interpolated as independent variables. The weak form of the governing equations of coupled hydro‐dynamic problems in saturated porous media within the element are given on the basis of the Hu–Washizu three‐field variational principle. In light of the stabilized one point quadrature super‐convergent element developed in solid continuum, the interpolation approximation modes for the primary unknowns and their spatial derivatives of the solid and the fluid phases within the element are assumed independently. The proposed mixed finite element formulation is derived. The non‐linear version of the element formulation is further derived with particular consideration of pressure‐dependent non‐associated plasticity. The return mapping algorithm for the integration of the rate constitutive equation, the consistent elastoplastic tangent modulus matrix and the element tangent stiffness matrix are developed. For geometrical non‐linearity, the co‐rotational formulation approach is used. Numerical results demonstrate the capability and the performance of the proposed element in modelling progressive failure characterized by strain localization due to strain softening in poroelastoplastic media subjected to dynamic loading at large strain. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Enhanced transverse shear strain shell formulation applied to large elasto‐plastic deformation problems

In this work, a previously proposed Enhanced Assumed Strain (EAS) finite element formulation for thin shells is revised and extended to account for isotropic and anisotropic material non‐linearities. Transverse shear and membrane‐locking patterns are successfully removed from the displacement‐based formulation. The resultant EAS shell finite element does not rely on any other mixed formulation, since the enhanced strain field is designed to fulfil the null transverse shear strain subspace coming from the classical degenerated formulation. At the same time, a minimum number of enhanced variables is achieved, when compared with previous works in the field. Non‐linear effects are treated within a local reference frame affected by the rigid‐body part of the total deformation. Additive and multiplicative update procedures for the finite rotation degrees‐of‐freedom are implemented to correctly reproduce mid‐point configurations along the incremental deformation path, improving the overall convergence rate. The stress and strain tensors update in the local frame, together with an additive treatment of the EAS terms, lead to a straightforward implementation of non‐linear geometric and material relations. Accuracy of the implemented algorithms is shown in isotropic and anisotropic elasto‐plastic problems. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Stabilized finite element method for viscoplastic flow: formulation with state variable evolution

A stabilized, mixed finite element formulation for modelling viscoplastic flow, which can be used to model approximately steady‐state metal‐forming processes, is presented. The mixed formulation is expressed in terms of the velocity, pressure and state variable fields, where the state variable is used to describe the evolution of the material's resistance to plastic flow. The resulting system of equations has two sources of well‐known instabilities, one due to the incompressibility constraint and one due to the convection‐type state variable equation. Both of these instabilities are handled by adding mesh‐dependent stabilization terms, which are functions of the Euler–Lagrange equations, to the usual Galerkin method. Linearization of the weak form is derived to enable a Newton–Raphson implementation into an object‐oriented finite element framework. A progressive solution strategy is used for improving convergence for highly non‐linear material behaviour, typical for metals. Numerical experiments using the stabilization method with hierarchic shape functions for the velocity, pressure and state variable fields in viscoplastic flow and metal‐forming problems show that the stabilized finite element method is effective and efficient for non‐linear steady forming problems. Finally, the results are discussed and conclusions are inferred. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Topology optimization of acoustic–structure interaction problems using a mixed finite element formulation

The paper presents a gradient‐based topology optimization formulation that allows to solve acoustic–structure (vibro‐acoustic) interaction problems without explicit boundary interface representation. In acoustic–structure interaction problems, the pressure and displacement fields are governed by Helmholtz equation and the elasticity equation, respectively. Normally, the two separate fields are coupled by surface‐coupling integrals, however, such a formulation does not allow for free material re‐distribution in connection with topology optimization schemes since the boundaries are not explicitly given during the optimization process. In this paper we circumvent the explicit boundary representation by using a mixed finite element formulation with displacements and pressure as primary variables (a u /p‐formulation). The Helmholtz equation is obtained as a special case of the mixed formulation for the elastic shear modulus equating to zero. Hence, by spatial variation of the mass density, shear and bulk moduli we are able to solve the coupled problem by the mixed formulation. Using this modelling approach, the topology optimization procedure is simply implemented as a standard density approach. Several two‐dimensional acoustic–structure problems are optimized in order to verify the proposed method. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Boundary element analysis of anisotropic rock masses

A boundary element formulation is developed for anisotropic elastic rock masses. The boundary element treatment in which the fundamental solutions of Lekhnitskii have been incorporated, and the numerical evaluation of integrals with singularities are discussed. Good agreement found between the numerical and analytical solutions for several example problems demonstrates the capability, accuracy and efficiency of the present formulation. The problem of a deep circular tunnel excavated in a variety of jointed rock masses has also been analysed using the present formulation. The effect of the jointing on the behaviour of the rock mass around the tunnel is evaluated.     

A finite element analysis of the singular stress fields in anisotropic materials loaded in antiplane shear

A finite element formulation is developed to determine the order and angular variation of singular stress states at material and geometric discontinuities in anisotropic materials subject to antiplane shear loading. The displacement field of the sectorial element is quadratic in the angular co-ordinate direction and asymptotic in the radial direction measured from the singular point. The formulation of Yamada and Okumura¹⁴ for in-plane problems is adapted for this purpose. The simplicity and accuracy of the formulation are demonstrated by comparison to several analytical antiplane shear solutions for both isotropic and anisotropic multi-material wedges and junctions with and without disbonds. The nature and speed of convergence of the eigensolution suggests that the solution presented here could be used in developing enriched elements for accurate and computationally efficient evaluation of stress intensity factors in problems having complex global geometries.     

Weak forms for modelling of rotationally symmetric,multilayered structures,including anisotropic poro‐elastic media

A weak form of the anisotropic Biot's equation represented in a cylindrical coordinate system using a spatial Fourier expansion in the circumferential direction is presented. The original three dimensional Cartesian anisotropic weak formulation is rewritten in an arbitrary orthogonal curvilinear basis. Introducing a cylindrical coordinate system and expanding the circumferential wave propagation in terms of orthogonal harmonic functions, the original, geometrically rotationally symmetric three dimensional boundary value problem, is decomposed into independent two‐dimensional problems, one for each harmonic function. Using a minimum number of dependent variables, pore pressure and frame displacement, a computationally efficient procedure for vibro‐acoustic finite element modelling of rotationally symmetric three‐dimensional multilayered structures including anisotropic porous elastic materials is thus obtained. By numerical simulations, this method is compared with, and the correctness is verified against, a full three‐dimensional Cartesian coordinate system finite element model. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A quasi-incompressible and quasi-inextensible element formulation for transversely isotropic materials

The contribution presents a new finite element formulation for quasi-inextensible and quasi-incompressible finite hyperelastic behavior of transeversely isotropic materials and addresses its computational aspects. The material formulation is presented in purely Eulerian setting and based on the additive decomposition of the free energy function into isotropic and anisotropic parts, where the former is further decomposed into isochoric and volumetric parts. For the quasi-incompressible response, the Q1P0 element formulation is outlined briefly, where the pressure-type Lagrange multiplier and its conjugate enter the variational formulation as an extended set of variables. Using the similar argumentation, an extended Hu-Washizu–type mixed variational potential is introduced, where the volume averaged fiber stretch and fiber stress are additional field variables. Within this context, the resulting Euler-Lagrange equations and the element formulation resulting from the extended variational principle are derived. The numerical implementation exploits the underlying variational structure, leading to a canonical symmetric structure. The efficiency of the proposed approached is demonstrated through representative boundary value problems. The superiority of the proposed element formulation over the standard Q1 and Q1P0 element formulation is studied through convergence analyses. The proposed finite element formulation is modular and exhibits very robust performance for fiber reinforced elastomers in the inextensibility limit.     

Boundary element analysis of fracture mechanics in anisotropic bimaterials

This paper presents a boundary element formulation for the analysis of linear elastic fracture mechanics problems involving anisotropic bimaterials. The most important feature associated with the present formulation is that it is a single domain method, and yet it is accurate, efficient and versatile. In this formulation, the displacement integral equation is collocated on the uncracked boundary only, and the traction integral equation is collocated on one side of the crack surface only. The complete Green's functions for anisotropic bimaterials are also derived and implemented into the boundary integral formulation so that discretization along the interface can be avoided except for the interfacial crack part. A special crack-tip element is introduced to capture exactly the crack-tip behavior.Numerical examples are presented for the calculations of stress intensity factors for a straight crack with various locations in infinite bimaterials. It is found that very accurate results can be obtained by the proposed method even with relatively coarse discretization. Numerical results also show that material anisotropy can greatly affect the stress intensity factor.     

Mixed‐enhanced formulation for geometrically linear axisymmetric problems

A four‐noded quadrilateral axisymmetric formulation in the context of a mixed‐enhanced method is presented. The strain field is represented by two sets of element parameters, which results in enhanced performance and coarse mesh accuracy in bending dominated problems and locking‐free response in the near incompressible limit. The mixed fields presented are such that variational stress recovery is permissible. In addition, the formulation is cast such that the mixed parameters are obtained explicitly yielding finite element arrays with the proper rank using standard order quadrature. In this paper our attention is restricted to the area of geometrically linear problems in solid mechanics. Representative simulations show favourable performance of the formulation. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Free vibration analysis of anisotropic solids with the boundary element method

In this paper, the boundary element method is employed for the solution of three-dimensional anisotropic free vibration problems. The formulation is based upon the use of static fundamental solutions in conjunction with the dual reciprocity method. This approach is very advantageous for the solution of free vibration problems and circumvents the problems related to the anisotropic dynamic fundamental solutions. By means of numerical examples, the influence of the internal collocation points on the representation of the mass matrix and the occurrence of complex-valued eigenfrequencies is investigated. The eigenfrequencies and mode shapes obtained with the boundary element method are compared to finite element computations and excellent agreement is observed.     

Modified flux-vector-based Green element method for problems in steady-state anisotropic media

In this study we present a new numerical technique for solving problems in steady-state heterogeneous anisotropic media, namely the ‘flux-vector-based’ Green element method (‘$\mathit{q}$-based’ GEM) for anisotropic media. This method, which is appropriate for problems where the permeability has either constant or continuous components over the whole domain, is based on the boundary element method (BEM) formulation for direct, steady-state flow problems in anisotropic porous media, which is applied to finite element method (FEM) meshes. For situations involving media discontinuities, an extension of this ‘$\mathit{q}$-based’ GEM formulation is proposed, namely the modified ‘$\mathit{q}$-based’ GEM for anisotropic media. Numerical results are presented for various physical problems that simulate flow in an anisotropic medium with diagonal layers of different permeabilities or around faults and wells, and they show that the new method, with the extensions proposed, is very suitable for steady-state problems in such media.     

Modal analysis of anisotropic plates using the boundary element method

A numerical formulation for analysis of dynamic problems of thin anisotropic plates bending is presented. The bending behavior follows Kirchhoff's hypothesis. The formulation is based on the direct boundary element method. The problem is simplified by using the elastostatic fundamental solution of an infinite plate. Domain integrals arising from inertial terms are transformed into boundary integrals using the dual reciprocity technique. Boundary integrals are discretized and evaluated numerically. Natural frequencies for free vibration are obtained and the respective mode shapes are shown. The accuracy of numerical results obtained is assured by comparison with analytical or finite element results.