Determination of the equivalent properties of periodic heterogeneous composite plates using the structural genome approach

A structural genome (SG) is defined as the smallest structural building block of composite materials. In this study, we use the concept of structure genome to propose a simple approach for obtaining the equivalent mechanical properties of periodic heterogeneous composite plates. Firstly, an SG from the structural model of a periodic heterogeneous composite plate is extracted. Secondly, a python script is developed in commercial software ABAQUS to conveniently impose periodic boundary conditions and apply different loads on the SG as well as obtain the equivalent mechanical properties of the structural genome. To verify the proposed SG approach, numerical examples are presented and discussed for both linear and nonlinear elastic cases. The results show that this approach is efficient and the results are of sufficient precision to calculate the mechanical properties of both linear and nonlinear elastic periodic heterogeneous composite plates.