Effects of surface energy on the nonlinear behaviors of laminated nanobeams

Using an improved multilayer-beams model, the surface effect caused by surface stress and surface elasticity on mechanical properties of laminated nanobeams in bending, bucking and vibration is incorporated into the nonlinear beam theory. Analytical solutions are obtained to study the influence of surface and interface effects for simply supported boundary conditions. Unlike the deduction of previous beam theory, the theoretical derivation in present work includes the effect of both surface and interface. Numerical cases of double layer and multilayer Nickel-silver laminated beams indicate that the interface effect observably change the elastic behaviour of laminated beams on the nanometer scale, especially for multilayer cases.