Background
Over the past 10 years, the trend in computational mechanics has been
to focus on increasingly demanding problems that require the ability to
treat large deformations, advanced materials, complex geometry, nonlinear
material behavior, discontinuities and singularities. This trend may be
seen in the simulation of manufacturing processes such as extrusion
where extremely large deformations occur, or in failure prediction where
the propagation of arbitrarily complex crack paths is of interest. Although
adaptive techniques and remeshing strategies have been developed for these
classes of problems, the most viable strategy for dealing with the emerging
class of simulation problems is believed to lie in the so-called meshfree
methods. These methods eliminate some or all of the traditional mesh-based
view of the computational domain and rely on a particle (either
Lagrangian or Eularian) view of the field problem. The interest for this
committee is on the emerging role of meshfree methods in the computational
mechanics arena.
Meshfree methods are over 20 years old, but have not enjoyed a focused
research effort until recently. The relatively recent rebirth of interest
in meshfree methods has led to a plethora of methods with a variety of
names.
DEM (diffuse element method),
EFG (element free Galerkin),
FPM (finite point method),
HP clouds,
MLPG (meshfree local Petrov Galerkin),
MLSPH (moving least squares SPH)
MPM (material-point method),
POU (partition of unity),
PUFEM (partition of unity finite element method),
RKPM (reproducing kernel particle method),
SPH (smooth particle hydrodynamics),
and a host of other methods
have emerged in the arena of meshfree methods. For the purposes of this
committee, all methods that abandon at least some aspect of a traditional
grid-based approach in favor of a meshfree view are considered to be in
the general class of Meshfree Methods.
Objectives
Due to the significant presence that "meshfree" methods have had in the
engineering and scientific community,
a USACM committee to promote these methods
has been formed. The overall objective for this committee is to help
establish the identity of meshfree methods and to pursue opportunities to
actively involve academia and industry in this research. The overall
objectives are:
- Establish ties to journals for publications.
- Establish a meshfree program associated with the US Congress.
- Establish a meshfree program associated with the World Congress.
- Distribute and share information on meshfree methods.
- Provide a focal point for meshfree research and applications. This
includes organizing workshops, etc.
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Tom Voth
Last modified: Tue Jul 3 10:43:35 MDT 2001