Geometrical imperfection and thermal effects on nonlinear stability of microbeams made of graphene-reinforced nano-composites

Abstract

This research is related to nonlinear stability analysis of advanced microbeams reinforced by Graphene Platelets (GPLs) considering generic geometrical imperfections and thermal loading effect. Uniform, linear and nonlinear distributions of GPLs in transverse direction have been considered. Imperfection sensitivity of post-bucking behaviors of the microbeam to different kinds of geometric imperfections have been examined. Geometric imperfection is first considered to be identical as the first buckling mode, then a generic function is employed to consider sine-type, local-type and global-type imperfectness. Modified couple stress theory is adopted to incorporate size-dependent behaviors of the beam at micro scale. The post-buckling problem is solved analytically to derive load-amplitude curves. It is shown that post-buckling behavior of microbeam is dependent on the type geometric imperfection and its magnitude. Also, post-buckling load can be enhanced by adding more GPLs or selecting a suitable distribution for GPLs.