Geometrically nonlinear analysis of smart functionally graded plates integrated with a layer of vertically reinforced 1–3 piezoelectric composite

摘要

This paper deals with the performance of the vertically reinforced 1–3 piezoelectric composite material as the distributed actuator for controlling nonlinear deformations of smart functionally graded (FG) plates. A nonlinear semi-analytical model based on von Karman type geometric nonlinearity has been derived for the FG plates integrated with a layer of this piezoelectric composite acting as the distributed actuator of the host FG plates. The material properties of the FG substrate plates are assumed to be graded along the thickness of the plates according to a simple power-law distribution in terms of the volume fractions of the constituents. The novelty of the work is that, unlike the existing analyses, the variational formulation of this electro-mechanical coupled problem utilizes the transverse actuation of the distributed actuator layer along its thickness for controlling the nonlinear deformations of the FG plates. The Galerkin method is employed to derive the nonlinear algebraic governing equations of the problem which are then solved by using the Newton–Raphson method. The numerical illustrations suggest the potential use of this vertically reinforced 1–3 piezoelectric composite material as the material for developing distributed actuators for controlling nonlinear deformations of smart FG structures.