The vritional inequalities of Hashin and Shtrikman are transformed to a simple and concise form. They are used to bound the effective conductivity tensor σ∗ of an anisotropic composite made from an arbitrary number of possibly anisotropic phases, and to bound the effective elasticity tensor C ∗ of an anisotropic mixture of two well-ordered isotropic materials. The bounds depend on the conductivities and elastic moduli of the components and their respective volume fractions. When the components are isotropic the conductivity bounds, which constrain the eigenvalues of σ∗, include those previously obtained by Hashin and Shtrikman, Murat and Tartar, and Lurie and Cherkaev. Our approach can also be used in the context of linear elasticity to derive bounds on C ∗ for composites comprised of an arbitrary number of anisotropic phases. For two-component composites our bounds are tighter than those obtained by Kantor and Bergman and by Francfort and Murat, and are attained by sequentially layered laminate materials.

Variational bounds on the effective moduli of anisotropic composites

This paper generalises the notion of two-scale convergence to the case of multiple separated scales of periodic oscillations. It allows us to introduce a multi-scale convergence method for the reiterated homogenisation of partial differential equations with oscillating coefficients. This new method is applied to a model problem with a finite or infinite number of microscopic scales, namely the homogenisation of the heat equation in a composite material. Finally, it is generalised to handle the homogenisation of the Neumann problem in a perforated domain.

Multiscale convergence and reiterated homogenisation

A general algebraic framework is developed for characterizing the set of possible effective tensors of composites. A transformation to the polarization-problem simplifies the derivation of the Hashin-Shtrikman variational principles and simplifies the calculation of the effective tensors of laminate materials. A general connection is established between two methods for bounding effective tensors of composites. The first method is based on the variational principles of Hashin and Shtrikman. The second method, due to Tartar, Murat, Lurie, and Cherkaev, uses translation operators or, equivalently, quadratic quasiconvex functions. A correspondence is established between these translation operators and bounding operators on the relevant non-local projection operator, T1. An important class of bounds, namely trace bounds on the effective tensors of two-component media, are given a geometrical interpretation: after a suitable fractional linear transformation of the tensor space each bound corresponds to a tangent plane to the set of possible tensors. A wide class of translation operators that generate these bounds is found. The extremal translation operators in this class incorporate projections onto spaces of antisymmetric tensors. These extremal translations generate attainable trace bounds even when the tensors of the two-components are not well ordered. In particular, they generate the bounds of Walpole on the effective bulk modulus. The variational principles of Gibiansky and Cherkaev for bounding complex effective tensors are reviewed and used to derive some rigorous bounds that generalize the bounds conjectured by Golden and Papanicolaou. An isomorphism is shown to underlie their variational principles. This isomorphism is used to obtain Dirichlet-type variational principles and bounds for the effective tensors of general non-selfadjoint problems. It is anticipated that these variational principles, which stem from the work of Gibiansky and Cherkaev, will have applications in many fields of science.

On characterizing the set of possible effective tensors of composites: The variational method and the translation method

We review the use of Young measures in analyzing relaxed and generalized formulations for typical problems of optimization including variational principles, optimal control problems, models in materials science, optimal design problems and nonlocal optimization problems.

https://www.ams.org/bull/1999-36-01/S0273-0979-99-00774-0/S0273-0979-99-00774-0.pdf

Optimization, relaxation and Young measures

A generic relaxation for stress constrained optimal design problems is presented. It is accomplished by introducing the stress constrained G closure. For a finite number of stress constraints, an explicit characterization of the stress constrained G closure is given. It is shown that the stress constrained G closure is characterized by all G limits together with their derivatives. A local representation of the set of all G limits and their derivatives is developed.

/pdf/stress-constrained-closure-and-relaxation-of-structural-15zrhtbh75.pdf

Stress constrained closure and relaxation of structural design problems

The paper deals with the existence of solutions for a class of optimal design problems. The notion of relaxation of an integral functional with respect toG-convergence is introduced, and a general integral representation theorem is obtained for the relaxed functional. For a particular class of functionals, this integral representation is computed explicitly.

E. Cabib

Papers

On a class of optimum problems in structural design