Energy minimizers in nonlinear elastostatics and the implicit function theorem (Q811156)

Existence results are derived for the pure displacement boundary value problem of nonlinear elastostatics. The material is homogeneous compressible hyperelastic with polyconvex stored energy function. There are two different ways to get existence results, firstly one uses the calculus of variation and the theory of polyconvex functions, secondly one applies the implicit function theorem in an infinite- dimensional space. The paper gives the conditions under which the equilibria obtained by these two different ways are the same. The applied method is based on the theory of null Lagrangian. The stability problem for general smooth solution is also analyzed and the generalization of the proven results are examined including the case of nonhomogeneous materials and not only the pure displacement boundary value problem.