PAMM · Proc. Appl. Math. Mech. 12, 265 – 266 (2012) / DOI 10.1002/pamm.

201210123

Prediction of microstructure in a Cosserat continuum using relaxed

energies
Muhammad Sabeel Khan1,∗ and Klaus Hackl1,∗∗
1
Institute of Mechanics-Material theory, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44801 Bochum

We develop a nonlinear incompressible multiphase material model in a Cosserat continuum with microstructure. The free
energy of the material is enriched with an interaction potential taking into account the intergranular kinematics at the contin-
uum scale. As a result the total energy becomes non-convex, thus giving rise to the development of microstructural phases.
To guarantee the existence of minimizers an exact quasi-convex envelope of the corresponding energy functional is derived.
As a result a three phase material energy appears, among them two of the phases are with microstructure in the translational
motion (displacment field) and micromotion (microrotation field), whereas the third phase is without internal structure. The
corresponding relaxed energy is then used for finding the minimizers of the two field minimization problem corresponding
to a Cosserat continuum. Results from a numerical example predicting the development of microstructure in the material are
presented.
c 2012 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

1 Introduction
Due to numerous applications of the Cosserat continuum theory in the granular media it got to our attention to consider the
inter-granular cohesive interaction of the particles. The key issue while discussing the intergranular kinematics of granular
material at the continuum scale is to establish a relation between the microscopic response of the material due to particle
interactions and its macroscopic behavior. The particles in the granular assembly at the microscale are discrete in nature.
Therefore to understand the effect of their interaction on the physical properties and the overall respose of the material at the
continuum scale has been a long discussion in the field of micromechanics of granular materials. We propose an interaction
energy potential which not only bridges the gap between microstructural properties and the macroscopic behavior of the
material but also enables us to characterize different microstructural phases in a granular material. The article is organized as
follows. Section 2 introduces the constituve model predicting material microstructure. Section 3 presents a numerical example
illustrating the behavior of the proposed model under tension test. Finally, conclusions are drawn in Section 4.

2 Constitutive theory of a Cosserat continuum with microstructure

In this section, a constitutive theory predicting the development of microstructure in a Cosserat continuum is developed. The
elastic free energy of a Cosserat material in its generalized setting is expressed as
1 1
W (u, ϕ) = e:C:e + κ:C:κ (1)
2 2
where C and C are the fourth order constitutive tensors of elastic constants, e and κ are the Cosserat and curvature strain
tensors respectively. For an isotropic material the quadratic free energy in a Cosserat continuum after taking into consideration
the intergranular kinematics reads
λ 2 2 2 λ 2 2 2
 2 2

2 2
W enh (u, ϕ) = (tr e) +µ kεk +µc kωk + (tr κ) +µ ksym κk +µc kasy κk +α kκk − β kdev εk (2)
2 2 | {z }
Interaction energy

where α and β are positive material constants. The resulting energy potential in (2) is nonconvex, therefore, we compute
its exact relaxed envelope by employing the direct methods in the calculus of variations [1]. As a result the material energy
comprises of three phases where in each one a constitutive relation holds as follows
Constitutive Formulae in Phase 1:
Phase 1 is corresponding to the case where the material has microstructure due to micromotions of the continuum particles.
  (
λ µ λ̄ tr κ I + 2(µ̄ − µ̄c ) sym κ + 2(µ◦ + βµ2 ) κ if µ̄ ≥ µ̄c ,
σ = 2 + tr ε I + 2µc asy e and µ = µ
2 d λ̄ tr κ I − 2(µ̄ − µ̄c ) asy κ + 2(µ◦ + β 2 ) κ if µ̄ < µ̄c .

∗ Corresponding author: e-mail khan.muhammadsabeel@rub.de, phone +49 234 32 26971, fax +49 234 32 14154
∗∗ E-mail Klaus.Hackl@rub.de, phone +49 234 32 25729, fax +49 234 32 14154

c 2012 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

266 Section 6: Material modelling in solid mechanics

_________________
PHASE
Table 1: Material parameters for
3.00E+00 the plate with a hole in tension test.
2.92E+00
2.83E+00
100 mm

2.75E+00
2.67E+00
E [MPa] 2.0 × 104
Y-axis
2.58E+00
1 mm
2.50E+00

X-axis
2.42E+00
2.33E+00
2.25E+00
ν [−] 0.3
2.17E+00
200 mm

2.0 × 102
2.08E+00
100 mm 2.00E+00
µc [MPa]
200 mm 100 mm
Time = 6.50E-01
α [N.mm2 ] 1.0 × 102
(a) a (b) b (c) c β [mm−1 ] 1.0 × 101
Fig. 1: (a) Geometry of the brick with hole and loading condition, (b) Re- µ [N] 3.0 × 102
duced Geometry due to symmetry and loading condition, (c) Distribution λ [N] 5.0 × 101
of microstructure in translational motions (red zone) and no microstructure µc [N] 2.0 × 102
(purple zone).

(3)
Constitutive Formulae in Phase 2:
Phase 2 is related to the case where there is no internal structure in the material.
σ = λ tr ε I + 2µ ε + 2µc asy e − 4αβ 2 (||κ||2 − β 2 ||dev ε||2 ) dev ε (4)
µ = λ̄ tr κ I + 2µ̄ sym κ + 2µ¯c asy κ + 4α (||κ||2 − β 2 ||dev ε||2 ) κ (5)
Constitutive Formulae in Phase 3:
This phase is connected to the case where the material has microstructure in translational motions of the continuum particles.
(
2 λ̄ tr κ I + 2(µ̄ − µ̄c ) sym κ if µ̄ ≥ µ̄c ,
σ = λ tr ε I + 2µ ε + 2µ◦ β devε + 2µc asy e and µ = (6)
λ̄ tr κ I − 2(µ̄ − µ̄c ) asy κ if µ̄ < µ̄c .
nR o
The energy minimization problem reads, find {u, ϕ} such that {u, ϕ} = arg min Ω W rel (u, ϕ) dV − ℓ (u, ϕ) | u, ϕ
along with Dirichlet boundary conditions u|∂Ωu = u◦ and ϕ|∂Ωϕ = ϕ◦ , where ℓ (u, ϕ) is the potential of external forces and
couples
Z Z Z
ℓ (u, ϕ) = (b · u + m · ϕ) dV + tu · u dS + tϕ · ϕ dS. (7)
Ω ∂Ωu ∂Ωϕ

Here b is the body force, m is the body moment, tu is the traction force and tϕ is the traction moment.

3 Numerical Example
A brick specimen subjected to a tension test is analyzed using the proposed model. For this purpose, a quasi-static displace-
ment controlled analysis is performed with the material parameters as described in Table 1. A Newton-Raphson iteration
scheme is used for solving the nonlinear equilibrium equations, where a tolerance of 1.0 × 10−8 is used. We observe from
Figure 1 that the material has microstructure in translational motions in a regime of high stresses.

4 Conclusion
An interaction energy potential is proposed which not only brigdes the gap between microstructural properties and the macro-
scopic response of the granular material but also enables us to predict the distribution of microstructure in the material. A
numerical simulation is provided where the distribution of microstructure in translational motions of the continuum particles
is observed in high stress zones of the material.

Acknowledgements The continuing support by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) of Pakistan is greatfully acknowledged for this
research work.

References
[1] B. Dacorogna, Direct methods in the calculus of variations (Springer Verlag, Berlin-Hiedelberg-New York, 1989).

c 2012 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim

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