Submission Deadline: 31 May 2021 (closed) View: 95
Plate/Shell and beam structures are widely used in engineering practice. As the thickness decreases, plate/shell structures can behave differently depending on their geometry, loading and boundary conditions; therefore, the development of reliable and efficient solution procedures is crucial for a trustworthy plate/shell structural analysis, especially for thin plate/shell problems. The history of FEM application in the analysis of plates and shells goes back 60 years, which is just a little shorter than the history of the FEM itself. While significant progress has been made over the years in the FEA of plate/shell and beam structures, there are still problems in this area to be solved. What seems even more important, the dissemination of advanced structural analysis systems may give the false impression that these great tools can solve all structural problems, and yet such is not the case. Researchers who have gone deeper into this subject are aware that many challenges still exist in the FEA of plate/shell problems, such as construction of shell finite elements for large deformation analysis of folded and multi-branch shells; advanced co-rotational approaches for large displacement and rotation analysis of plates/shells; preventing the locking phenomena in triangular plate/shell element; modeling of sandwich and laminated shells; solving fluid-structure interactions involving beams/rods or plates/shells; modeling of materials with enhanced performance characteristics; recognizing structural and material inhomogeneity; considering coupling between mechanical, electric, magnetic and thermal effects etc.
Topics of interest for this special issue include, but are not limited to: plate/shell or beam finite element formulations using advanced formulations; novel elements with fine convergence and computational accuracy; large deformation analysis of folded and multi-branch shells; static and dynamic instability; fluid-structure interaction; structural reliability analysis; imperfection sensitivity and reliability; failure simulation of shell structures under extreme loading conditions; effects of structural and material inhomogeneity; multi-scale and multi-phase composite materials; modern design descriptions; other advanced finite element procedures for large displacement and large rotation analysis; high-quality review papers on finite element approaches for plate/shell or beam theories are also welcome.