Covariant formulation of the tensor algebra of non-linear elasticity

Abstract

This work aims at obtaining a covariant representation of the elasticity tensor of a hyperelastic material when the elastic strain energy potential is written employing the volumetric–distortional decomposition of the deformation. This requires the careful definition of some fundamental fourth-order tensors: the identity, the spherical operator, and the deviatoric operator, which appear in the material and spatial expressions of the elasticity tensor. These operators can be defined in the spatial or the material setting and admit pulled-back and pushed-forward forms, respectively. These forms are intimately related to the pulled-back and pushed-forward metric tensors, and are somewhat awkward to derive in Cartesian coordinates, because of the loss of the distinction between a vector space and its dual, and therefore between objects having contravariant and covariant components, which obey to different transformation laws. The relationship between the deformation and the various forms of the identity, spherical, and deviatoric operators can be entirely clarified only within a covariant theory, where the central role played by the spatial and material metric tensors, and their pulled-back and pushed-forward counterparts, which are deformation tensors, can be emphasised.