Analytical or Semi-analytical Solutions of Functionally Graded Material Structures (eBook)

This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the analysis of functionally graded materials and structures. Functionally graded materials (FGMs), in which the volume fractions of two or more constituent materials are designed to vary continuously as a function of position along certain direction(s), have been developed and studied over the past three decades. The major advantage of FGMs is that no distinct internal boundaries exist, and failures from interfacial stress concentrations developed in conventional components can be avoided. The gradual change of material properties can be tailored to different applications and working environments. As these materials' range of application expands, new methodologies have to be developed to characterize them, and to design and analyze structural components made of them.

Despite a number of existing papers on the analysis of functionally graded materials and structures, there is no single book that is devoted entirely to the analysis of functionally graded beams, plates and shells using different methods, e.g.,analytical or semi-analytical methods.

Filling this gap in the literature, the book offers a valuable reference resource for senior undergraduates, graduate students, researchers, and engineers in this field. The results presented here can be used as a benchmark for checking the validity and accuracy of other numerical solutions. They can also be used directly in the design of functionally graded materials and structures. 

Zheng Zhong completed his Bachelor of Engineering, his Master of Engineering, and his Ph.D. at Tsinghua University in 1985, 1987 and 1991, respectively. He joined the faculty of Tongji University as Assistant Professor in 1991, before being promoted to Associate Professor in 1994, and to Full Professor in 1998. He was a visiting scholar at the University of Toronto from 1995 to 1996. Professor Zhong has been working in the area of functionally graded materials and structures for more than ten years. He has served as the principal investigator for several grants and projects, has published over 200 technical papers, and was selected for the Chinese National Outstanding Young Teacher Award in 2000 and Chinese National Excellent Young Investigator Fund in 2001. 

Guojun Nie received her Ph.D. degree from Tongji University, China, in 2002, and is currently Professor at its School of Aerospace Engineering and Applied Mechanics. Her research interests include the mechanics of inhomogeneous materials, structural mechanics and computational mechanics. She has published more than 30 journal papers in these areas.

---

This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the analysis of functionally graded materials and structures. Functionally graded materials (FGMs), in which the volume fractions of two or more constituent materials are designed to vary continuously as a function of position along certain direction(s), have been developed and studied over the past three decades. The major advantage of FGMs is that no distinct internal boundaries exist, and failures from interfacial stress concentrations developed in conventional components can be avoided. The gradual change of material properties can be tailored to different applications and working environments. As these materials' range of application expands, new methodologies have to be developed to characterize them, and to design and analyze structural components made of them.Despite a number of existing papers on the analysis of functionally graded materials and structures, there is no single book that is devoted entirely to the analysis of functionally graded beams, plates and shells using different methods, e.g.,analytical or semi-analytical methods.Filling this gap in the literature, the book offers a valuable reference resource for senior undergraduates, graduate students, researchers, and engineers in this field. The results presented here can be used as a benchmark for checking the validity and accuracy of other numerical solutions. They can also be used directly in the design of functionally graded materials and structures.