Blog posts

Johnson Matthey CASE/EPSRC PhD Studentship Award

In this paper, the first-order shear deformation plate (FSDT) model is exploited to investigate the mechanical behavior of laminated composite and functional graded plates. Three approaches are developed to transform the laminated composite plate, with stepped material properties, to an equivalent functionally graded (FG) plate with a continuous property function across the plate thickness. Such transformations are used to determine the details of a functional graded plate equivalent to the original laminated one. In addition it may provide an easy and efficient way to investigate the behavior of multilayer composite plates, with direct and less computational efforts. A comparative study has been developed to compare the effectiveness of the three proposed transformation procedures.

In the theory of dislocations, the Burgers vector is usually defined by referring to a crystal structure. Using the notion of affine development of curves on a differential manifold with a connection, we give a differential geometric definition of the Burgers vector directly in the continuum setting, without making use of an underlying crystal structure.

The Research Center for Mechanics of Solids, Structures and Materials at the University of Texas at Austin invites applications for an open position as Post-doctoral Fellow. The specific project involves the characterization of the constitutive and failure behavior of structural materials (aluminum alloys, steels, titanium alloys, metal-matrix composites, polymers and other selected materials) under quasi-static and dynamic conditions.

Two PhD student positions at Particles and Grains Laboratory, The University of Sydney, Australia