Micro-macro modeling of inelastic behavior of heterogeneous structures

Publisher Summary This chapter integrates within the analysis a physically more sound explanation of inelastic behavior of structures, which can be provided at the scale where dissipative mechanisms remain simple and uncoupled that is in general referred to as “microscale.” The ever increasing computational resources provide an important incentive to strive for a more refined modeling of inelastic behavior of engineering structures. In that sense, the role of the traditional phenomenological models, which have been predominantly used in engineering design, is nowadays being very actively reexamined.