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Geometrically nonlinear bending of functionally graded nanocomposite trapezoidal plates reinforced with graphene platelets (GPLs)

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Abstract

This paper investigates the nonlinear bending behaviours of functionally graded trapezoidal nanocomposite plates reinforced with graphene platelets (GPLs) under thermo-mechanical loading by employing finite element method. The modified Halpin–Tsai model and rule of mixtures are adopted to determine the Young’s modulus, Poisson’s ratio and the thermal expansion coefficient of the nanocomposites. The influences of a number of factors, including the distribution pattern, concentration and size of GPLs, plate geometry and temperature, on the nonlinear bending of the nanocomposite plates are comprehensively investigated. Numerical results demonstrate that dispersing a small amount of GPLs into nanocomposites can significantly enhance the nonlinear bending performance of the trapezoidal plates. The trapezoidal plates with more GPLs dispersing close to the top and bottom surfaces has the minimum bending deflection and are less sensitive to the temperature increases. GPLs with fewer layers and larger surface area are better reinforcing fillers than their counterparts. Moreover, the plates with bigger bottom angles are found to have better bending performances. However, when the bottom angles are greater than 75°, the variation of the bottom angles will have limited effects on the bending behaviours of the trapezoidal plates.

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Acknowledgements

The work described in the present paper is fully funded by research Grants from the Australian Research Council under Discovery Project scheme (DP160101978) and Linkage Project scheme (LP140100747). The authors are grateful for the financial support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Engineering, RMIT University, PO Box 71, Bundoora, VIC, 3083, Australia

    Zhan Zhao, Chuang Feng, Youheng Dong, Yu Wang & Jie Yang

  2. School of Mechanics and Engineering, Southwest Jiaotong University, Chengdu, 610031, People’s Republic of China

    Youheng Dong

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  1. Zhan Zhao
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  2. Chuang Feng
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  3. Youheng Dong
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  4. Yu Wang
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  5. Jie Yang
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Correspondence to Jie Yang.

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Zhao, Z., Feng, C., Dong, Y. et al. Geometrically nonlinear bending of functionally graded nanocomposite trapezoidal plates reinforced with graphene platelets (GPLs). Int J Mech Mater Des 15, 791–800 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10999-019-09442-4

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