Advanced Composite Materials Applied to Structural Mechanics

Dear Colleagues,

Composite materials can be widely considered in various types of structures employed in different engineering fields due to their enhanced mechanical properties, which can improve the structural behavior of these elements. Indeed, composite materials provide higher values of strength and stiffness, superior thermal properties, lower levels of weights, which can affect the mechanical behavior of beams, plates and shells, in terms of static response, vibrations, and buckling loads.

This Special Issue aims to gather several researches that investigate the dynamic behavior, static response, as well as the buckling mechanism of engineering structures made of composite materials. In addition to fiber-reinforced composites and laminates, studies on innovative components such as functionally graded materials (FGMs), Carbon nanotubes (CNTs), SMART constituents, as well as innovative and advanced classes of composites are welcomed. For these purposes, authors are invited to provide detailed constitutive models that could investigate and justify also the initiation and progression of damage. Thus, researches about delamination and debonding phenomena, fracture mechanics at different scales and adhesion of composite solids and interface between materials also fit the topics of this Special Issue.

Different methodologies are accepted as far as the description of mechanical response is concerned for enhanced structures and composite materials characterized by internal length scales and non-local behaviors. For instance, classical theories, micromechanical approaches, cohesive zone modeling of brittle and ductile materials, regularization and approximation of crack discontinuities, can be presented and discussed to this aim. Contributions are welcome, both on theoretical, experimental and numerical aspects from scientists working on mathematics and mechanics.

The mechanical response of these composite systems could be analyzed through a set of parametric studies, in order to investigate the effect of the staking sequences, ply orientations, agglomeration of nanoparticles, volume fractions of the constituents, and porosity level on their structural behavior. The effect of different external fields, such as mechanical, thermal, electrical, and magnetic, could be also taken into account, provided that a complete theoretical framework is presented and well-discussed.

Dr. Nicholas Fantuzzi
Asst. Prof. Rossana Dimitri
Guest Editors

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