Date of Award
Fall 1993
Document Type
Thesis - Restricted
Degree Name
Master of Science (MS)
Department
Physics
First Advisor
Day, Art
Second Advisor
Mendelson, Kenneth S.
Third Advisor
Tani, Smio
Abstract
Composite materials are materials that consist of two or more different constituents. Many composite materials have properties that are superior to those of their constituent parts. Consequently, there has been a rapid growth in the use of composite materials in engineering applications and therefore the study of composites is one of great practical importance. It is also a difficult problem of intrinsic theoretical interest. In this thesis, we use numerical simulations to study the elastic properties of composite materials in two dimensions. We use a spring-grid model to study a two dimension elastic sheet containing elliptical holes, and compare our simulation results with Effective Medium Theory (EMT). We found that the EMTs don't describe the physical situation very well. But our simulation are in good agreement with several exact results which provides confidence in the model. We have also developed a visual display system to show the energy and stress fields in the composite material which is used to increase our understanding of the connection between microstructure and properties.
Recommended Citation
Yang, Yuguang, "The Elastic Properties of Composite Materials: Numerical Simulations and the Visualization of Data" (1993). Master's Theses (1922-2009) Access restricted to Marquette Campus. 2348.
https://epublications.marquette.edu/theses/2348