Sundararajan Natarajan

Pramod Y Kumbhar, Amrita Francis, Narasimhan Swaminathan et al.

In this paper, we discuss the implementation of a cell based smoothed finite element method (CSFEM) within the commercial finite element software Abaqus. The salient feature of the CSFEM is that it does not require an explicit form of the derivative of the shape functions and there is no isoparametric mapping. This implementation is accomplished by employing the user element subroutine (UEL) feature of the software. The details on the input data format together with the proposed user element subroutine, which forms the core of the finite element analysis are given. A few benchmark problems from linear elastostatics in both two and three dimensions are solved to validate the proposed implementation. The developed UELs and the associated input files can be downloaded from Github repository link: https://github.com/nsundar/SFEM\_in\_Abaqus.

Octavio A. González-Estrada, Sundararajan Natarajan, Juan José Ródenas et al.

An error control technique aimed to assess the quality of smoothed finite element approximations is presented in this paper. Finite element techniques based on strain smoothing appeared in 2007 were shown to provide significant advantages compared to conventional finite element approximations. In particular, a widely cited strength of such methods is improved accuracy for the same computational cost. Yet, few attempts have been made to directly assess the quality of the results obtained during the simulation by evaluating an estimate of the discretization error. Here we propose a recovery type error estimator based on an enhanced recovery technique. The salient features of the recovery are: enforcement of local equilibrium and, for singular problems a "smooth+singular" decomposition of the recovered stress. We evaluate the proposed estimator on a number of test cases from linear elastic structural mechanics and obtain precise error estimations whose effectivities, both at local and global levels, are improved compared to recovery procedures not implementing these features.

Ahmad Akbari Rahimabadi, Sundararajan Natarajan, Stephane P. A. Bordas

In this paper, the effect of a centrally located cutout (circular and elliptical) and cracks emanating from the cutout on the free flexural vibration behaviour of functionally graded material plates in thermal environment is studied. The discontinuity surface is represented independent of the mesh by exploiting the partition of unity method framework. A Heaviside function is used to capture the jump in the displacement across the discontinuity surface and asymptotic branch functions are used to capture the singularity around the crack tip. An enriched shear flexible 4-noded quadrilateral element is used for the spatial discretization. The properties are assumed to vary only in the thickness direction. The effective properties of the functionally graded material are estimated using the Mori- Tanaka homogenization scheme and the plate kinematics is based on the first order shear deformation theory. The influence of the plate geometry, the geometry of the cutout, the crack length, the thermal gradient and the boundary conditions on the free flexural vibration is numerically studied.

Javier Videla, Sundararajan Natarajan, Stephane PA Bordas

A new $n-$ noded polygonal plate element is proposed for the analysis of plate structures comprising of thin and thick members. The formulation is based on the discrete Kirchhoff Mindlin theory. On each side of the polygonal element, discrete shear constraints are considered to relate the kinematical and the independent shear strains. The proposed element: (a) has proper rank; (b) passes patch test for both thin and thick plates; (c) is free from shear locking and (d) yields optimal convergence rates in $L^2-$norm and $H^1-$semi-norm. The accuracy and the convergence properties are demonstrated with a few benchmark examples.

S Natarajan, M Ganapathi, S Bordas

In this paper, the flutter behaviour of simply supported square functionally graded material plates immersed in a supersonic flow is studied. An enriched 4-noded quadrilateral element based on field consistency approach is used for this study and the crack is modelled independent of the underlying mesh. The material properties are assumed to be temperature dependent and graded only in the thickness direction. The effective material properties are estimated using the rule of mixtures. The formulation is based on the first order shear deformation theory and the shear correction factors are evaluated employing the energy equivalence principle. The influence of the crack length, the crack orientation, the flow angle and the gradient index on the aerodynamic pressure and the frequency are numerically studied. The results obtained here reveal that the critical frequency and the critical pressure decreases with increase in crack length and it is minimum when the crack is aligned to the flow angle.

Hou Man, Chongmin Song, Sundararajan Natarajan et al.

This paper presents a technique for stress and fracture analysis by using the scaled boundary finite element method (SBFEM) with quadtree mesh of high-order elements. The cells of the quadtree mesh are modelled as scaled boundary polygons that can have any number of edges, be of any high orders and represent the stress singularity around a crack tip accurately without asymptotic enrichment or other special techniques. Owing to these features, a simple and automatic meshing algorithm is devised. No special treatment is required for the hanging nodes and no displacement incompatibility occurs. Curved boundaries and cracks are modelled without excessive local refinement. Five numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the simplicity and applicability of the proposed technique.

Rishi Mishra, Smriti, Balaji Srinivasan et al.

Physics-informed extreme learning machines (PIELMs) typically impose boundary and initial conditions through penalty terms, yielding only approximate satisfaction that is sensitive to user-specified weights and can propagate errors into the interior solution. This work introduces Null-Space Projected PIELM (NP-PIELM), achieving exact constraint enforcement through algebraic projection in coefficient space. The method exploits the geometric structure of the admissible coefficient manifold, recognizing that it admits a decomposition through the null space of the boundary operator. By characterizing this manifold via a translation-invariant representation and projecting onto the kernel component, optimization is restricted to constraint-preserving directions, transforming the constrained problem into unconstrained least-squares where boundary conditions are satisfied exactly at discrete collocation points. This eliminates penalty coefficients, dual variables, and problem-specific constructions while preserving single-shot training efficiency. Numerical experiments on elliptic and parabolic problems including complex geometries and mixed boundary conditions validate the framework.

Anirudh Kalyan, Sundararajan Natarajan

In this paper, the physics informed neural networks (PINNs) is employed for the numerical simulation of heat transfer involving a moving source. To reduce the computational effort, a new training method is proposed that uses a continuous time-stepping through transfer learning. Within this, the time interval is divided into smaller intervals and a single network is initialized. On this single network each time interval is trained with the initial condition for (n+1)th as the solution obtained at nth time increment. Thus, this framework enables the computation of large temporal intervals without increasing the complexity of the network itself. The proposed framework is used to estimate the temperature distribution in a homogeneous medium with a moving heat source. The results from the proposed framework is compared with traditional finite element method and a good agreement is seen.

Hirshikesh, C Jansari, K Kannan et al.

An adaptive phase field method is proposed for crack propagation in brittle materials under quasi-static loading. The adaptive refinement is based on the recovery type error indicator, which is combined with the quadtree decomposition. Such a decomposition leads to elements with hanging nodes. Thanks to the polygonal finite element method, the elements with hanging nodes are treated as polygonal elements and do not require any special treatment. The mean value coordinates are used to approximate the unknown field variables and a staggered solution scheme is adopted to compute the displacement and the phase field variable. A few standard benchmark problems are solved to show the efficiency of the proposed framework. It is seen that the proposed framework yields comparable results at a fraction of the computational cost when compared to standard approaches reported in the literature.

Sundararajan Natarajan, Stéphane P. A. Bordas, Ean Tat Ooi

We revisit the cell-based smoothed finite element method (SFEM) for quadrilateral elements and extend it to arbitrary polygons and polyhedrons in 2D and 3D, respectively. We highlight the similarity between the SFEM and the virtual element method (VEM). Based on the VEM, we propose a new stabilization approach to the SFEM when applied to arbitrary polygons and polyhedrons. The accuracy and the convergence properties of the SFEM are studied with a few benchmark problems in 2D and 3D linear elasticity. Later, the SFEM is combined with the scaled boundary finite element method to problems involving singularity within the framework of the linear elastic fracture mechanics in 2D.