Nonlocal plasticity-based damage modeling in quasi-brittle materials using an isogeometric approach
Authors: Rawat Angel , Piska Raghu , Rajagopal A. , Hossain Mokarram 
Published: February 2021

Purpose
This paper aims to present a nonlocal gradient plasticity damage model to demonstrate the crack pattern of a body, in an elastic and plastic state, in terms of damage law. The main objective of this paper is to reconsider the nonlocal theory by including the material in-homogeneity caused by damage and plasticity. The nonlocal nature of the strain field provides a regularization to overcome the analytical and computational problems induced by softening constitutive laws. Such an approach requires C1 continuous approximation. This is achieved by using an isogeometric approximation (IGA). Numerical examples in one and two dimensions are presented.

Design/methodology/approach
In this work, the authors propose a nonlocal elastic plastic damage model. The nonlocal nature of the strain field provides a regularization to overcome the analytical and computational problems induced by softening constitutive laws. An additive decomposition of strains in to elastic and inelastic or plastic part is considered. To obtain stable damage, a higher gradient order is considered for an integral equation, which is obtained by the Taylor series expansion of the local inelastic strain around the point under consideration. The higher-order continuity of nonuniform rational B-splines (NURBS) functions used in isogeometric analysis are adopted here to implement in a numerical scheme. To demonstrate the validity of the proposed model, numerical examples in one and two dimensions are presented.

Findings
The proposed nonlocal elastic plastic damage model is able to predict the damage in an accurate manner. The numerical results are mesh independent. The nonlocal terms add a regularization to the model especially for strain softening type of materials. The consideration of nonlocality in inelastic strains is more meaningful to the physics of damage. The use of IGA framework and NURBS basis functions add to the nonlocal nature in approximations of the field variables.

Research limitations/implications
The method can be extended to 3D. The model does not consider the effect of temperature and the dissipation of energy due to temperature. The method needs to be implemented for more real practical problems and compare with experimental work. This is an ongoing work.

Practical implications
The nonlocal models are suitable for predicting damage in quasi brittle materials. The use of elastic plastic theories allows to capture the inelastic deformations more accurately.

Social implications
The nonlocal models are suitable for predicting damage in quasi brittle materials. The use of elastic plastic theories allows to capture the inelastic deformations more accurately.

Originality/value
The present work includes the formulation and implementation of a nonlocal damage plasticity model using an isogeometric discretization, which is the novel contribution of this paper. An implicit gradient enhancement is considered to the inelastic strain. During inelastic deformations, the proposed strain tensor partitioning allows the use of a distinct potential surface and distinct failure criterion for both damage and plasticity models. The use of NURBS basis functions adds to more nonlocality in the approximation.