The MFrontGenericInterfaceSupport project

Abstract

The ability to easily integrate user-defined constitutive equations plays a major role in the versatility of (mechanical) solvers1. Constitutive equations describe how the internal state variables of a material evolve with changing external conditions or mechanical loading. Those state variables can describe many microstructural aspects of the material (grain size, dislocation density, hardening state, etc.) or be phenomenological in nature (equivalent plastic strain). The knowledge of those internal state variables allows the computation of local thermodynamic forces which affect the material equilibrium at the structural scale. Due to the large number of phenomena that can be described in this manner, such as plasticity, viscoplasticity, or damage, computational mechanics is one of the most demanding domains for advanced constitutive equations.