Related papers: Effects of constraint curvature on structural inst…
A highly deformable rod, modelled as the extensible elastica, is connected to a movable clamp at one end and to a pin sliding along a frictionless curved profile at the other. Bifurcation analysis shows that axial compliance provides a…
A structural element is designed and investigated, forming the basis for the development of an elastic multistable metamaterial. The leitmotif of the structural design is the implementation of a strut characterized by a bifurcation…
Mechanical instabilities can be exploited to design innovative structures, able to change their shape in the presence of external stimuli. In this work, we derive a mathematical model of an elastic beam subjected to an axial force and…
It is shown that a compound elastic structure, which displays a dynamic instability, may be designed as the union (or 'fusion') of two structures which are stable when separately analyzed. The compound elastic structure has two degrees of…
A thin flat rectangular plate supported on its edges and subjected to in-plane loading exhibits stable post-buckling behaviour. However, the introduction of a nonlinear (softening) elastic foundation may cause the response to become…
Euler buckling epitomises mechanical instabilities: An inextensible straight elastic line buckles under compression when the compressive force reaches a critical value $F_\ast>0$. Here, we extend this classical, planar instability to the…
A famous and thoroughly investigated instability set-up, susceptible to wrinkling and creasing, consists of an elastic half-space being prestressed under a dead load, applied at infinity and, possibly, on its surface. We consider the case…
The design of compliant mechanisms is crucial in several technologies and relies on the availability of solutions for nonlinear structural problems. One of these solutions is given and experimentally validated in the present article for a…
Wrinkles are often observed on the surfaces of compressed soft materials in nature. In the past few decades, the fascinating surface patterns have been studied extensively by using the linear bifurcation analysis under plane strain. The…
Slender elastic objects such as a column tend to buckle under loads. While static buckling is well understood as a bifurcation problem, the evolution of shapes during dynamic buckling is much harder to study. Elastic rings under normal…
The discovery of configurational forces acting on elastic structures and its initial applications are reviewed. Configurational forces are related to the possibility that an elastic structure can change its configuration, thus inducing a…
Many physical systems can be modelled as parameter-dependent variational problems. In numerous cases, multiple equilibria co-exist, requiring the evaluation of their stability, and the monitoring of transitions between them. Generally, the…
The bifurcation problem of a circular Euler-Bernoulli rod subject to a uniform radial force distribution is investigated under three distinct loading conditions: (i.) hydrostatic pressure, (ii.) centrally-directed, and (iii.) dead load.…
The preference of thin flat sheets to bend rather than stretch, combined with results from Geometry, mean that changes in a thin sheet's Gaussian curvature are prohibitively expensive. As a result, an imposed curvature in one principal…
Many elastic structures exhibit rapid shape transitions between two possible equilibrium states: umbrellas become inverted in strong wind and hopper popper toys jump when turned inside-out. This snap-through is a general motif for the…
Buckling and barrelling instabilities in the uniaxial compressions of an elastic rectangle have been studied by many authors under lubricated end conditions. However, in practice it is very difficult to realize such conditions due to…
A block of rubber eventually buckles under severe flexure, and several axial wrinkles appear on the inner curved face of the bent block. Experimental measurements reveal that the buckling occurs earlier ---at lower compressive strains---…
Elastic strips provide a canonical system for studying the mechanisms governing elastic shape transitions. Buckling, linear snap-through, and nonlinear snap-through have been observed in boundary-actuated strips and linked to the type of…
A rectangular thin elastic sheet is deformed by forcing a contact between two points at the middle of its length. A transition to buckling with stress focusing is reported for the sheets sufficiently narrow with a critical width…
Viscous flows within an elastic structure apply stress on the solid-liquid interface. The stress-field created by the viscous flow can be utilized to counter stress created by external forces and thus may be applied as a tool for delaying…