A variable order constitutive relation for viscoelasticity

A constitutive relation for linear viscoelasticity of composite materials is formulated using the novel concept of Variable Order (VO) differintegrals. In the model proposed in this work, the order of the derivative is allowed to be a function of the independent variable (time), rather than a constant of arbitrary order. We generalize previous works that used fractional derivatives for the stress and strain relationship by allowing a continuous spectrum of non-integer dynamics to describe the physical problem. Starting with the assumption that the order of the derivative is a measure of the rate of change of disorder within the material, we develop a statistical mechanical model that is in agreement with experimental results for strain rates varying more than eight orders of magnitude in value. We use experimental data for an epoxy resin and a carbon/epoxy composite undergoing constant compression rates in order to derive a VO constitutive equation that accurately models the linear viscoelastic deformation in time. The resulting dimensionless constitutive equation agrees well with all the normalized data while using a much smaller number of empirical coefficients when compared to available models in the literature.

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