Eur. Phys. J. Plus (2016) 131: 383
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/i2016-16383-0

Regular Article

Nonlocal thermo-elastic wave propagation in temperature-dependent embedded small-scaled nonhomogeneous beams

Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Imam Khomeini International University, Qazvin, Iran

^* e-mail: febrahimy@eng.ikiu.ac.ir

Received: 13 April 2016
Accepted: 4 October 2016
Published online: 4 November 2016

Abstract

In this paper, the thermo-elastic wave propagation analysis of a temperature-dependent functionally graded (FG) nanobeam supported by Winkler-Pasternak elastic foundation is studied using nonlocal elasticity theory. The nanobeam is modeled via a higher-order shear deformable refined beam theory which has a trigonometric shear stress function. The temperature field has a nonlinear distribution called heat conduction across the nanobeam thickness. Temperature-dependent material properties change gradually in the spatial coordinate according to the Mori-Tanaka model. The governing equations of the wave propagation of the refined FG nanobeam are derived by using Hamilton’s principle. The analytic dispersion relation of the embedded nonlocal functionally graded nanobeam is obtained by solving an eigenvalue problem. Numerical examples show that the wave characteristics of the functionally graded nanobeam are related to the temperature distribution, elastic foundation parameters, nonlocality and material composition.