Graduation Semester and Year

2013

Language

English

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy in Aerospace Engineering

Department

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

First Advisor

Seiichi Nomura

Abstract

Predicting the macroscopic response of heterogeneous materials has been the subject of extensive research in the engineering community, even more so, in the composites guild. With analytical solutions being almost impossible to obtain for such open ended problems, and numerical techniques being computationally expensive, semi-analytical methods are highly sought after. This dissertation is one such effort aimed at presenting a semi-analytical approach that serves as a confluence of effective analytical and numerical techniques, to solve for engineering fields in a heterogeneous material characterized by inclusions embedded in a matrix medium. The approach essentially involves the analytical derivation of permissible functions, in terms of geometrical and material parameters, which satisfy the peripheral and interface conditions, followed by an appropriate approximation maneuver that furnishes an expression for the physical field of interest. The semi-analytical solutions so obtained are corroborated by FEM solutions. The effectiveness of the approach is demonstrated by means of suitable examples. Two case studies have been deliberated upon - one is the 2-D Poisson type equation that essentially describes the steady state heat conduction with volumetric heat generation, and the other is the 2-D stress equilibrium equation with body forces.

Disciplines

Aerospace Engineering | Engineering | Mechanical Engineering

Comments

Degree granted by The University of Texas at Arlington

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