Shape design sensitivity analysis for geometrically and materially nonlinear problems by the boundary element method (Q1204992)

This paper is concerned with the determination of design sensitivity coefficients (DSCs) for ``fully nonlinear'' problems --- i.e. problems with both material and geometric nonlinearities --- in solid mechanics. The elastic strains are assumed to be small, but the nonelastic (plastic or viscoplastic) strains, as well as rotations, can be arbitrarily large. The direct differentiation approach of the relevant derivative boundary element method formulation is employed to obtain the DSCs. A general computer program is developed for the analysis of two-dimensional (plane strain and plane stress) problems. Numerical results are obtained for illustrative problems and are compared against direct solutions. The results from the two methods agree almost perfectly for these problems.