Effective moduli of hyperelastic porous media at large deformation

Summary.  Among the parameters affecting the overall material properties of porous media, the most significant involve the micromechanical morphology, the matrix material behavior and the applied load range. Considering a unit cell for the porous medium, several approaches of the material response are developed, which yield the effective properties of the medium. Numerical results are presented and compared with experimental or analytical data available in literature. Proposed formulations impose several material characterizations ranging from linear elastic to incompressible hyperelastic. In the case of nonlinear materials, a special formulation has been developed permitting prediction of the porous material moduli. This formulation considers a special nonlinear form for the strain energy function under specific loading conditions. The proposed method yields simple formulas approximating the effective moduli of porous media, which are useful for design purposes. Received August 3, 2001; revised August 14, 2002 Published online: January 16, 2003 Acknowledgements The first of the authors is grateful to his mentor Dr. Paul J. Blatz for his encouragement all these years for continuous research on the nonlinear theories of hyperelastic materials.