Mini Symposium Details

15: Non-standard Formulations and Discretization Methods for Thin-walled Structures

• Bastian Oesterle, Institute for Structural Mechanics, University of Stuttgart
• Wolfgang Dornisch, Chair of Applied Mechanics, University of Kaiserslautern
• Michael Breitenberger, Chair of Structural Analysis, Technical University of Munich
• Josef Kiendl, Department of Marine Technology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology

In recent years, an increased activity in the scientific field of formulations and discretization methods for plate and shell structures can be observed. The topic has received a major boost due to the popularity of the isogeometric concept along with finite element methods using NURBS or B-Splines as shape functions. Here, one of the decisive features is a relatively easy control of continuity of shape functions, facilitating discretization of problems for which the weak form has a variational index of 2 or larger. This applies, for instance, to the classical Kirchhoff-Love thin shell model, which currently experiences a renaissance.

The proposed mini-symposium invites all contributions from the field of non-standard formulations and discretization methods for thin-walled structures, both from method development and application. Typical topics are expected to be, but not restricted to: spline-based discretizations, formulations based on subdivision surfaces, non-local (patch-based) or smoothed finite elements, meshless methods, finite cell methods, isogeometric analysis and integration of CAD and CAE, rotation-free formulations for plates and shells, non-linear analyses, treatment of boundary conditions or trimmed surfaces as well as multi-layer and solid shell elements.