The Mechanics And Thermodynamics Of Continua

The Mechanics and Thermodynamics of Continua presents a unified treatment of continuum mechanics and thermodynamics that emphasises the universal status of the basic balances and the entropy imbalance. These laws are viewed as fundamental building blocks on which to frame theories of material behaviour. As a valuable reference source, this book presents a detailed and complete treatment of continuum mechanics and thermodynamics for graduates and advanced undergraduates in engineering, physics and mathematics. The chapters on plasticity discuss the standard isotropic theories and, in addition, crystal plasticity and gradient plasticity.

This title proposes a unified approach to continuum mechanics which is consistent with Galilean relativity. Based on the notion of affine tensors, a simple generalization of the classical tensors, this approach allows gathering the usual mechanical entities — mass, energy, force, moment, stresses, linear and angular momentum — in a single tensor. Starting with the basic subjects, and continuing through to the most advanced topics, the authors' presentation is progressive, inductive and bottom-up. They begin with the concept of an affine tensor, a natural extension of the classical tensors. The simplest types of affine tensors are the points of an affine space and the affine functions on this space, but there are more complex ones which are relevant for mechanics − torsors and momenta. The essential point is to derive the balance equations of a continuum from a unique principle which claims that these tensors are affine-divergence free.

Reprinted from Archive for Rational Mechanics and Analysis edited by C. Truesdell

From the reviews: "The book is excellent, and covers a very broad area (usually treated as separate topics) from a unified perspective. [...] It will be very useful for both mathematicians and physicists." EMS Newsletter

This text is intended to provide a modern and integrated treatment of the foundations and applications of continuum mechanics. There is a significant increase in interest in continuum mechanics because of its relevance to microscale phenomena. In addition to being tailored for advanced undergraduate students and including numerous examples and exercises, this text also features a chapter on continuum thermodynamics, including entropy production in Newtonian viscous fluid flow and thermoelasticity. Computer solutions and examples are emphasized through the use of the symbolic mathematical computing program Mathematica®.

Treats subjects directly related to nonlinear materials modeling for graduate students and researchers in physics, materials science, chemistry and engineering.

The notion of continuum thermodynamics, adopted in this book, is primarily understood as a strategy for development of continuous models of various physical systems. The examples of such a strategy presented in the book have both the classical character (e. g. thermoelastic materials, viscous fluids, mixtures) and the extended one (ideal gases, Maxwellian fluids, thermoviscoelastic solids etc. ). The latter has been limited intentionally to non-relativistic models; many important relativistic applications of the true extended thermodynamics will not be considered but can be found in the other sources. The notion of extended thermodynamics is also adopted in a less strict sense than suggested by the founders. For instance, in some cases we allow the constitutive dependence not only on the fields themselves but also on some derivatives. In this way, the new thermodynamical models may have some features of the usual nonequilibrium models and some of those of the extended models. This deviation from the strategy of extended thermodynamics is motivated by practical aspects; frequently the technical considerations of extended thermodynamics are so involved that one can no longer see important physical properties of the systems. This book has a different form from that usually found in books on continuum mechanics and continuum thermodynamics. The presentation of the formal structure of continuum thermodynamics is not always as rigorous as a mathematician might anticipate and the choice of physical subjects is too disperse to make a physicist happy.

This title proposes a unified approach to continuum mechanics which is consistent with Galilean relativity. Based on the notion of affine tensors, a simple generalization of the classical tensors, this approach allows gathering the usual mechanical entities — mass, energy, force, moment, stresses, linear and angular momentum — in a single tensor. Starting with the basic subjects, and continuing through to the most advanced topics, the authors' presentation is progressive, inductive and bottom-up. They begin with the concept of an affine tensor, a natural extension of the classical tensors. The simplest types of affine tensors are the points of an affine space and the affine functions on this space, but there are more complex ones which are relevant for mechanics − torsors and momenta. The essential point is to derive the balance equations of a continuum from a unique principle which claims that these tensors are affine-divergence free.