Topics: Analysis of continuous systems; differential and variational formulations

• Basic concepts in the analysis of continuous systems
• Differential and variational formulations
• Essential and natural boundary conditions
• Definition of C^m-1 variational problem
• Principle of virtual displacements
• Relation between stationarity of total potential, the principle of virtual displacements, and the differential formulation
• Weighted residual methods, Galerkin, least squares methods
• Ritz analysis method
• Properties of the weighted residual and Ritz methods
• Example analysis of a nonuniform bar, solution accuracy, introduction to the finite element method

Instructor: Klaus-Jürgen Bathe