research

Since James Watt, a Scottish inventor, improve the efficiency of steam engine, human civilization relies more and more on a steady supply of energy. The re-rise as an international superpower and the global energy crisis are challenging China and the world. We are at a transitional age. On the one hand, we see the technology advances in exploration and development of oil and gas, a depleting resource; and the growth in handling ageing and decommissioning. On the other hand, we see ideas and plans for new energy structure in the future.

In phase field method how one can specify the crack in fixed grid?



In case of finite element method one uses two overlapping nodes to model crack, which nodes separate after crack propagation. In case of phase-field, generally people use fixed grid finite difference method. My question is how the same node point can show two different displacements when crack has passed through it like FEM?

Can buckling and instability of a structure be affected by Eshelby forces?  

We provide a positive answer to this question, see http://www.ing.unitn.it/~bigoni/blade.html

A highly deformable capacitor made of a soft dielectric and two conformal

electrodes can switch between two states discontinuously, by a first-order transition, as the total

charge varies gradually. When the total charge is small, it spreads evenly over the area of the

capacitor, and the capacitor deforms homogeneously. When the total charge is large, it localizes in

a small region of the capacitor, and this region thins down preferentially. The capacitor will