Exterior statistics based boundary conditions for representative volume elements of elastic composites

Statistically equivalent representative volume elements or SERVEs are representations of the microstructure that are used for micromechanical simulations to generate homogenized material constitutive responses and properties (Swaminathan et al., 2006a, Ghosh, 2011). Typically, a SERVE is generated from the parent microstructure as a statistically equivalent region, whose size is determined from the requirements of convergence of macroscopic properties. Standard boundary conditions, such as affine transformation-based displacement boundary conditions (ATDBCs), uniform traction boundary conditions (UTBCs) or periodic boundary conditions (PBCs) are conventionally applied on the SERVE boundary for micromechanical simulations. However, when the microstructure is characterized by arbitrary, nonuniform distributions of heterogeneities, these simple boundary conditions do not represent the effect of regions exterior to the SERVE. Improper boundary conditions can result in significantly larger than optimal SERVE domains, needed for converged properties. In an attempt to overcome the limitations of the conventional boundary conditions on the SERVE, this paper explores the effect of boundary conditions that incorporate the statistics of the exterior region on the SERVE of elastic composites. Using Green's function based interaction kernels, coupled with statistical functions of the microstructural characteristics like one-point and two-point correlation functions, a novel exterior statistics-based boundary condition or ESBC is derived for the SERVE. The advantages of the ESBC are established by comparing with results of simulations using conventional boundary conditions. Results of the SERVE simulations subjected to ESBCs are also compared with those from other popular methods like statistical volume element (SVE) and weighted statistical volume element (WSVE). The proposed ESBCs offer significant advantages over other methods in the SERVE-based analysis of heterogeneous materials.