Bending and wave propagation analysis of axially functionally graded beams based on a reformulated strain gradient elasticity theory

A new size-dependent axially functionally graded(AFG) micro-beam model is established with the application of a reformulated strain gradient elasticity theory(RSGET). The new micro-beam model incorporates the strain gradient, velocity gradient,and couple stress effects, and accounts for the material variation along the axial direction of the two-component functionally graded beam. The governing equations and complete boundary conditions of the AFG beam are derived based on Hamilton's principle. The correctness of the current model is verified by comparing the static behavior results of the current model and the finite element model(FEM) at the micro-scale. The influence of material inhomogeneity and size effect on the static and dynamic responses of the AFG beam is studied. The numerical results show that the static and vibration responses predicted by the newly developed model are different from those based on the classical model at the micro-scale. The new model can be applied not only in the optimization of micro acoustic wave devices but also in the design of AFG micro-sensors and micro-actuators.

From Gradient Elasticity to Gradient Interatomic Potentials: The Case-Study of Gradient London Potential

Motivated by the special theory of gradient elasticity (GradEla), a proposal is advanced for extending it to construct gradient models for interatomic potentials, commonly used in atomistic simulations. Our focus is on London’s quantum mechanical potential which is an analytical expression valid until a certain characteristic distance where “attractive” molecular interactions change character and become “repulsive” and cannot be described by the classical form of London’s potential. It turns out that the suggested internal length gradient (ILG) generalization of London’s potential generates both an “attractive” and a “repulsive” branch, and by adjusting the corresponding gradient parameters, the behavior of the empirical Lennard-Jones potentials is theoretically captured.

Phase field modeling of ferroelastic variant switching in yttria-stabilized t'zirconia with strain gradient elasticity and interface tension

The 6–8 wt%yttria-stabilized zirconia with a tetragonal structure(t’-YSZ)is extensively employed in thermal barrier coatings.The exceptional fracture toughness of t’-YSZ can be attributed to its distinctive ferroelastic toughening mechanism.Microstructure and interface tension play a critical role in ferroelastic variant switching at the micro-and nano-scale.This paper presents an original thermodynamically consistent phase field(PF)theory for analyzing ferroelastic variant switching at the micro-and nano-scale of t’-YSZ.The theory incorporates strain gradient elasticity using higher-order elastic energy and interface tension tensor via geometric nonlinearity to represent biaxial tension resulting from interface energy.Subsequently,a mixed-type formulation is employed to implement the higher-order theory through the finite element method.For an interface in equilibrium,the effects of strain gradient elasticity result in a more uniform distribution of stresses,whereas the presence of interface tension tensor significantly amplifies the stress magnitude at the interface.The introduction of an interface tension tensor increases the maximum value of stress at the interface by a factor of 4 to 10.The nucleation and evolution of variants at a pre-existing crack tip in a mono-phase t’-YSZ have also been studied.The strain gradient elasticity is capable of capturing the size effect of ferroelastic variant switching associated with microstructures in experiments.Specifically,when the grain size approaches that of the specimen,the critical load required for variant switching at the crack tip increases,resulting in greater dissipation of elastic energy during ferroelastic variant switching.Moreover,the interface tension accelerates the evolution of variants.The presented framework exhibits significant potential in modeling ferroelastic variant switching at the micro-and nano-scale.

Static and Dynamic Analysis of a Piezoelectric Semiconductor Cantilever Under Consideration of Flexoelectricity and Strain Gradient Elasticity

In this work,the static and dynamic response of a piezoelectric semiconductor cantilever under the transverse end force with consideration of flexoelectricity and strain gradient elasticity is systematically investigated.The one-dimensional governing equations and the corresponding boundary conditions are derived based on Hamilton’s principle.After that,combining with the linearized equations for the conservation of charge,the effects of characteristic length and flexoelectric coefficient on the working performance of a ZnO nanowire are demonstrated as a numerical case,including the static mechanical and electric fields,natural frequencies,and the frequency–response characteristics at resonances.The results indicate that the flexoelectric effect has a great influence on the electric properties of the nanowire,while the strain gradient effect directly contributes to its mechanical properties.To some extent,the increase in characteristic length is equivalent to the stiffness strengthening.The qualitative results and quantitative data are beneficial for revealing the underlying physical mechanism and provide guidance for the design of piezoelectric semiconductor devices.

A NONLINEAR MICROBEAM MODEL BASED ON STRAIN GRADIENT ELASTICITY THEORY

A micro scale nonlinear beam model based on strain gradient elasticity is developed. Governing equations of motion and boundary conditions are obtained in a variational framework. As an example, the nonlinear vibration of microbeams is analyzed. In a beam having a thickness to length parameter ratio close to unity, the strain gradient effect on increasing the natural frequency is predominant. By increasing the beam thickness, this effect decreases and geometric nonlinearity plays the main role on increasing the natural frequency. For some specific ratios, both geometric nonlinearity and size effects have a significant role on increasing the natural frequency.

Velocity gradient elasticity for nonlinear vibration of carbon nanotube resonators

In this study,for the first time,we investigate the nonlocality superimposed to the size effects on the nonlinear dynamics of an electrically actuated single-walled carbon-nanotube-based resonator.We undertake two models to capture the nanostructure nonlocal size effects:the strain and the velocity gradient theories.We use a reduced-order model based on the differential quadrature method(DQM)to discretize the goverming nonlinear equation of motion and acquire a discretized-parameter nonlinear model of the system.The structural nonlinear behavior of the system assuming both strain and velocity gradient theories is investigated using the discretized model.The results suggest that nonlocal and size effects should not be neglected because they improve the prediction of corresponding dynamic amplitudes and,most importantly,the critical resonant frequencies of such nanoresonators.Neglcting these effects may impose a considerable source of error,which can be amended using more accurate modeling techniques.

Propagation of Thermo-Elastic Waves at Several Typical Interfaces Based on the Theory of Dipolar Gradient Elasticity

The reflection and transmission properties of thermo-elastic waves at five possible interfaces between two different strain gradient thermo-elastic solids are investigated based on the generalized thermo-elastic theory without energy dissipation （the GN theory）. First, the function of free energy density is postulated and the constitutive relations are defined. Then, the temperature field and the displacement field are obtained from the motion equation in the form of displacement and the thermal transport equation without energy dissipation in the strain gradient thermo-elastic solid. Finally, the five types of thermo-elastic interracial conditions are used to calculate the amplitude ratios of the reflection and transmission waves with respect to the incident wave. Further, the reflection and transmission coefficients in terms of energy flux ratio are calculated and the numerical results are validated by the energy conservation along the normal direction. It is found that there are five types of dispersive waves, namely the coupled longitudinal wave （the CP wave）, the coupled thermal wave （the CT wave）, the shear wave, and two evanescent waves （the coupled SP wave and SS wave）, that become the surface waves at an interface. The mechanical interfacial conditions mainly influence the coupled CP waves, SV waves, and surface waves, while the thermal interracial conditions mainly influence the coupled CT waves.

A Family of Nonconforming Rectangular Elements for Strain Gradient Elasticity

We propose a family of nonconforming rectangular elements for the linear strain gradient elastic model.Optimal error estimates uniformly with respect to the small material parameter have been proved.Numerical results confirm the theoretical prediction.

C^1 natural element method for strain gradient linear elasticity and its application to microstructures

C^1 natural element method （C^1 NEM） is applied to strain gradient linear elasticity, and size effects on mi crostructures are analyzed. The shape functions in C^1 NEM are built upon the natural neighbor interpolation （NNI）, with interpolation realized to nodal function and nodal gradient values, so that the essential boundary conditions （EBCs） can be imposed directly in a Galerkin scheme for partial differential equations （PDEs）. In the present paper, C^1 NEM for strain gradient linear elasticity is constructed, and sev- eral typical examples which have analytical solutions are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the constructed method. In its application to microstructures, the size effects of bending stiffness and stress concentration factor （SCF） are studied for microspeciem and microgripper, respectively. It is observed that the size effects become rather strong when the width of spring for microgripper, the radius of circular perforation and the long axis of elliptical perforation for microspeciem come close to the material characteristic length scales. For the U-shaped notch, the size effects decline obviously with increasing notch radius, and decline mildly with increasing length of notch.

Isogeometric nonlocal strain gradient quasi-three-dimensional plate model for thermal postbuckling of porous functionally graded microplates with central cutout with different shapes

This study presents the size-dependent nonlinear thermal postbuckling characteristics of a porous functionally graded material(PFGM) microplate with a central cutout with various shapes using isogeometric numerical technique incorporating nonuniform rational B-splines. To construct the proposed non-classical plate model, the nonlocal strain gradient continuum elasticity is adopted on the basis of a hybrid quasithree-dimensional(3D) plate theory under through-thickness deformation conditions by only four variables. By taking a refined power-law function into account in conjunction with the Touloukian scheme, the temperature-porosity-dependent material properties are extracted. With the aid of the assembled isogeometric-based finite element formulations,nonlocal strain gradient thermal postbuckling curves are acquired for various boundary conditions as well as geometrical and material parameters. It is portrayed that for both size dependency types, by going deeper in the thermal postbuckling domain, gaps among equilibrium curves associated with various small scale parameter values get lower, which indicates that the pronounce of size effects reduces by going deeper in the thermal postbuckling regime. Moreover, we observe that the central cutout effect on the temperature rise associated with the thermal postbuckling behavior in the presence of the effect of strain gradient size and absence of nonlocality is stronger compared with the case including nonlocality in absence of the strain gradient small scale effect.

Reflection and transmission of elastic waves at five types of possible interfaces between two dipolar gradient elastic half-spaces

Reflection and transmission of an incident plane wave at five types of possible interfaces between two dipolar gradient elastic solids are studied in this paper. First, the explicit expressions of monopolar tractions and dipolar tractions are derived from the postulated function of strain energy density. Then, the displacements, the normal derivative of displacements, monopolar tractions, and dipolar tractions are used to create the nontraditional interface conditions. There are five types of possible interfaces based on all possible combinations of the displacements and the normal derivative of displacements. These interfacial conditions with consideration of microstructure effects are used to determine the amplitude ratio of the reflection and transmission waves with respect to the incident wave. Further, the energy ratios of the reflection and transmission waves with respect to the incident wave are calculated. Some numerical results of the reflection and transmission coefficients are given in terms of energy flux ratio for five types of possible interfaces. The influences of the five types of possible interfaces on the energy partition between the refection waves and the transmission waves are discussed, and the concept of double channels of energy transfer is first proposed to explain the different influences of five types of interfaces.

The Pressure Gradient Elastic Wave： Energy Transfer Process for Compressible Fluids with Pressure Gradient

The temperature separation was discovered inside the short vortex chamber （H/D = 0.18）. Experiments revealed that the highest temperature of the periphery was 465 ℃, and the lowest temperature of the central zone was -45 ℃ （the compressed air was pumped into the chamber at room temperature）. The objective of this paper is to proof that this temperature separation effect cannot be explained by conventional heat transfer processes. To explain this phenomenon, the concept of PGEW （Pressure Gradient Elastic Waves） is proposed. PGEW are kind of elastic waves, which operate in compressible fluids with pressure gradients and density fluctuations. The result of PGEW propagation is a heat transfer from area of low pressure to high pressure zone. The physical model of a gas in a strong field of mass forces is proposed to substantiate the PGEW existence. This physical model is intended for the construction of a theory of PGEW. Understanding the processes associated with the PGEW permits the possibility of creating new devices for energy saving and low potential heat utilization, which have unique properties.

Mechanical Properties of Graphene within the Framework of Gradient Theory of Adhesion

The gradient model of two-dimensional defectless medium is formulated. A graphene sheet is examined as an example of such two-dimensional medium. The problem statement of a graphene sheet deforming in its plane and the bending problem are examined. It is ascertained that the statement of the first problem is equivalent to the flat problem statement of Toupin gradient theory. The statement of the bending problem is equivalent to the plate bending theory of Timoshenko with certain reserves. The characteristic feature of both statements is the fact that the mechanical properties of the sheet of graphene are not defined by “volumetric” moduli but by adhesive ones which have different physical dimension that coincides with the dimension of the corresponding stiffness of classical and nonclassical plates.

Analysis of wave propagation in micro/nanobeam-like structures: A size-dependent model

By incorporating the strain gradient elasticity into the classical Bernoulli-Euler beam and Timoshenko beam models, the size-dependent characteristics of wave propaga- tion in micro/nanobeams is studied. The formulations of dis- persion relation are explicitly derived for both strain gradi- ent beam models, and presented for different material length scale parameters （MLSPs）. For both phenomenological size- dependent beam models, the angular frequency, phase veloc- ity and group velocity increase with increasing wave num- ber. However, the velocity ratios approach different values for different beam models, indicating an interesting behavior of the asymptotic velocity ratio. The present theory is also compared with the nonlocal continuum beam models.

Effects of local thickness defects on the buckling of micro-beam

A buckling model of Timoshenko micro-beam with local thickness defects is established based on a modified gradient elasticity.By introducing the local thickness defects function of the micro-beam,the variable coefficient differential equations of the buckling problem are obtained with the variational principle.Combining the eigensolution series of the complete micro-beam with the Galerkin method,we obtain the critical load and buckling modes of the micro-beam with defects.The results show that the depth and location of the defect are the main factors affecting the critical load,and the combined effect of boundary conditions and defects can significantly change the buckling mode of the micro-beam.The effect of defect location on buckling is related to the axial gradient of the rotation angle,and defects should be avoided at the maximum axial gradient of the rotation angle.The model and method are also applicable to the static deformation and vibration of the micro-beam.

On non-singular GRADELA crack fields

A brief account is provided on crack-tip solutions that have recently been published in the literature by employing the so-called GRADELA model and its variants. The GRADELA model is a simple gradient elasticity theory involving one internal length in addition to the two Lame＇ constants, in an effort to eliminate elastic singularities and discontinuities and to interpret elastic size effects. The non-singular strains and non-singular （but sometimes singular or even hypersingular） stresses derived this way under different boundary conditions differ from each other and their physical meaning in not clear. This is discussed which focus on the form and physical meaning of non-singular solutions for crack-tip stresses and strains that are possible to obtain within the GRADELA model and its extensions.

FREE TRANSVERSE VIBRATIONS OF A DOUBLE-WALLED CARBON NANOTUBE:GRADIENT AND INTERNAL INERTIA EFFECTS

This is a modest contribution on higher-order continuum theory for predicting size effects in small-scale objects. It relates to a preceding article of the journal by the same authors（AMSS, 2013, 26： 9-20） which considered the longitudinal dynamical analysis of a gradient elastic fiber but, in addition to an internal length, an internal time parameter is also introduced to model delay/acceleration effects associated with the underlying microstructure. In particular, the free transverse vibration of a double-walled carbon nanotube（DWNT） is studied by employing gradient elasticity with internal inertia. The inner and outer carbon nanotubes are modeled as two individual elastic beams interacting with each other through van der Waals（vdW） forces. General explicit expressions are derived for the natural frequencies and the associated inner-to-outer tube amplitude ratios for the case of simply supported DWNTs. The effects of internal length（or scale）and internal time（or inertia） on the vibration behavior are evaluated. The results indicate that the internal length and time parameters of the adopted strain gradient-internal inertia generalized elasticity model have little influence on the lower order coaxial and noncoaxial vibration modes,but a significant one on the higher order modes.

DYNAMIC ANALYSIS OF A GRADIENT ELASTIC POLYMERIC FIBER

A dynamic analysis of an elastic gradient-dependent polymeric fiber subjected to a periodic excitation is considered. A nonlinear gradient elasticity constitutive equation with strain- dependent gradient coefficients is first derived and the dispersive wave propagation properties for its linearized counterpart are briefly discussed. For the linearized problem a variational formulation is also developed to obtain related boundary conditions of both classical （standard） and non-classical （gradient） type. Analytical solutions in the form of Fourier series for the fiber＇s displacement and strain fields are provided. The solutions depend on a dimensionless scale parameter （the diameter to length radio d = D/L） and, therefore, size effects are captured.

Vibration analysis of nano-structure multilayered graphene sheets using modified strain gradient theory

In this paper, for the first time, the modified strain gradient theory is used as a new size-dependent Kirchhoff micro-plate model to study the effect of interlayer van der Waals （vdW） force for the vibration analysis of multilayered graphene sheets （MLGSs）. The model contains three material length scale parameters, which may effectively capture the size effect. The model can also degenerate into the modified couple stress plate model or the classical plate model, if two or all of the material length scale parameters are taken to be zero. After obtaining the governing equations based on modified strain gradient theory via principle of minimum potential energy, as only infinitesimal vibration is considered, the net pressure due to the vdW interaction is assumed to be linearly proportional to the deflection between two layers. To solve the goveming equation subjected to the boundary conditions, the Fourier series is assumed for w = w（x, y）. To show the accuracy of the formulations, present results in specific cases are compared with available results in literature and a good agreement can be seen. The results indicate that the present model can predict prominent natural frequency with the reduction of structural size, especially when the plate thickness is on the same order of the material length scale parameter.

Gradient estimates for parabolic systems from composite material

In this paper, we derive W^(1,∞) and piecewise C^(1,α) estimates for solutions, and their t-derivatives, of divergence form parabolic systems with coefficients piecewise H¨older continuous in space variables x and smooth in t. This is an extension to parabolic systems of results of Li and Nirenberg [Comm Pure Appl Math, 2003, 56:892–925] on elliptic systems. These estimates depend on the shape and the size of the surfaces of discontinuity of the coefficients, but are independent of the distance between these surfaces.