Sharif Digital Repository

This thesis analyses the relationship between performance and capital structure of listed companies in the Tehran stock exchange. For examining this relationship, we use trade-off theory. This theory states that using debt comes with some benefits and costs for the company. If this theory holds true, we expect that in a low debt capital structure, as a result of benefits of using debt surpasses the costs of it, the relationship between debt and performance should be positive and in a high debt capital structure, as a result of costs of using debt surpasses the benefits of it, using more debt should have negative relationship with performance. For examining this relationship, we first gather... 

In practice, structures made of concrete are full of cracks. The strength of concrete is mainly determined by the tensile strength, which is about 10% of the compressive strength. As long as cracking in concrete is unavoidable, we have to try to minimize their detrimental effects. This objective can be achieved by resisting (or limiting) propagation of existing cracks. Because of this, reinforcement (mostly steel) is used to increase the carrying capacity of the material and to control the development of cracks. Concrete structures that fail, already shows a large number of large and small cracks before their maximum carrying capacity is reached. The failure of concrete can be characterized... 

This research introduces a novel thermo-mechanical multiscale technique, utilizing machine learning, for simulating the compaction process of aluminum nanopowders with surface oxidation at various temperatures. The methodology employed involves the utilization of nonlinear thermo-mechanical Finite Element Method (FEM) for macro scale analysis, while employing the Molecular Dynamics (MD) method to calculate the mechanical and thermal characteristics of aluminum nanopowders at the nano-scale. The first part of the research presents a comprehensive study on the thermal conductivity of alumina-coated aluminum nanopowders, which is a crucial property for their application in powder metallurgy,... 

In this thesis, a fully coupled numerical model is developed for the modeling of dynamic cohesive crack propagation and hydraulic fracture in saturated porous media using extended finite element method. Many engineering structures like concrete or soil dams and buildings foundation are built with porous materials like concrete, rock and soil. Behavior of these materials in which void among the solid particles are filled with one or more fluids are so complicated rather than single solid phase. Dynamic analysis of porous mediums containing a discontinuity has many applications in various civil engineering fields including structure, earthquake, hydraulic structures, etc. For instance... 

Fracture is one of the most important engineering problems, and the lack of knowledge about this phenomenon will result in loss of life and property. Before the computer age, fracture mechanics has been studied by many analytical mechanics researchers; and after that, lots of attempts have been done to accurately model this phenomenon.
Finite element method, one of the best methods in Computational Mechanics, is common in computational fracture mechanics. Polygonal finite element is a new concept which has been recently applied in finite element analysis. This research utilized this concept in com-putational fracture mechanics. In another word, the crack discontinuity and crack tip... 

The band gap offset is an effect of coordination numbers (CNs) of atoms reduction at the edge of transversal cross-section Si nanowires (SiNWs) which would be of increasingly important for greater shell-core ratio sections. In this paper, a hierarchical multi-scale modeling has been developed to simulate edge effect on the band gap shift of SiNWs due to geometry effect induced strain in the self-equilibrium state. Classical Molecular Dynamics (MD) approach and Finite Element Method (FEM) are used in the micro (atomic) and macro scale levels, respectively. Using the Cauchy-Born (CB) hypothesis as a correlator of continuum and atomic properties, the atomic positions are related to the... 

Contact between different parts of a system and their interactions on each other is one of the most important phenomena that we face in modeling a variety of mechanical issues which should be carefully considered. Sometimes, this phenomenon occurs between different components in a phase and some other times between several phases, which, causes changes in the performance and response of the system. Therefore, in order to investigate its effect in particular on dynamic problems that are subject to severe changes over a short period of time, and to provide more effective methods for dealing with it, the subject of this research has been devoted to dynamic contact modeling with large... 

In this thesis, a coarse-grained multi-scale method for 2D crystallyn solids based-on finite element consepts has presented. In this method, both scales are atomic scale and similar to what we see in non-local QC method, the entire atomic structure will be intact. Accordingly, calculations of potential functions and forces in the domain will have the atomic accuracy. In the presented method to reduce the domain’s degrees of freedom, the classical finite-element meshing concept to mesh the elastic linear areas in the domain is used and the MD calculations will done on the mesh nodes. Therefore, degrees of freedom in the system will reduce and consequently, the computational cost will reduce.... 

In present research forming process of nanopowders, which is a part of powder metallurgy was investigated by molecular dynamics method. Powder metallurgy is a relatively new method for production of industrial parts by pouring powder into die and compaction to desired density. One can reach parts with higher quality and strength by decreasing size of powder’s particles and entering the nano scale. Particle with smaller size have higher specific surface and due more intensity to react. Classic methods for investigation of this process don’t cover the atomic scale effects, so using newer procedures such as molecular dynamics is highly recommended. In present research, at first compaction of... 

Every year, fracture imposes high economic costs and casualties to all societies. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, scientific approach to this issue has lead to invention of a new branch in mechanics, called fracture mechanics. In general, fracture problems fall into two categories. Brittle fracture, like what happens in glass, in which, few plastic deformations and energy absorption occurs and ductile fracture, which is preceded by large plastic deformations and energy absorption. This kind of fracture is usual in ductile metals like low carbon steel. Finite Element which is considered as the most important numerical method in the mechanics of materials, is also, widely used in... 

Soil structures have important roles in civil engineering applications. The most important types of these structures are soil dams and foundations which their damages may cause huge loss. Thus, appropriate analysis of these structures under possible loading conditions is unavoidable. The real behavior of this media can be achieved from the solution of its coupled governing differential equations. In order to solve this set of equations in practical applications, appropriate numerical solutions should be used. The finite element method can be called as one of the most important numerical solutions of differential equations which have been used in analyzing different types of engineering... 

In the limit case of incompressibility, the displacement-based finite element methods are not capable of finding the solutions with adequate accuracy. Moreover, discontinuities in displacement field or strain field which exist in the interior of the elements should be dealt with appropriately. The u/p mixed formulation provides a suitable context for modeling the incompressible problems. It is capable of solving general problems in which there exist geometrical or material nonlinearities. In the case of employing the eXtended Finite Element Method (XFEM), uniform meshes can be used for problems with discontinuities and in fact the discontinuities can be decoupled from the mesh. In this... 

The constitutive modeling of material is clearly a keystone of successful quantitative solution possibilities. No finite element code will provide results of better quality than that of the constitutive equation implemented in it. In this study, a nonassociated three-invariant cap plasticity model is presented for material under compressive stress. Generalized single-cap plasticity is developed which is based on the hardening-softening material functions. The hardening functions are consisted of isotropic and kinematic parts. Using the definition of yield surface, material functions and nonlinear elastic behavior, as function of hardening-softening parameters, the constitutive elasto-plastic... 

The present research illustrate the finite element modeling of contact between solid bodies, with a special emphasis on the imposing the contact constraints and modification of contact properties on surface in the case of frictional slip. A new approach for both two-dimensional and three-dimensional formulation of contact constraint that allows for a simple and unified treatment of all potential contact scenarios in the presence of large deformations in static case, is presented. The most important outstanding issue in this approach is symmetrical contact stiffness matrix which reduces computational efforts. Based on the observation of numerical results and comparison by experimental models,... 

Numerical methods in fracture and crack propagation problems usually involve high computational costs. Adaptive finite element method is one of the techniques which can be used to simulate the crack propagation with an acceptable accuracy. In this thesis, various constitutive models are implemented for simulation of fracture, including the linear elastic fracture mechanics, cohesive zone model and continuum damage mechanics. The fracture mechanical evaluation is performed on a general integral technique for non-planar curved cracks in LEFM. In the second model, a bilinear cohesive zone model is applied to implement the traction-separation law. The Lemaitre damage model is employed and the... 

Twophase medias are one of the most complicated medias in engineering and because of its importance, its been considered by a lot of researchers ever since. Varaioty of the problems in these medias, has ended in lots of methods for studing them. The primariative efforts in modeling deformable pouros medias was done by Terzaghi and others have improved the primary consepts and have suggested different methods. One of the most common and applicable methods in these medias is u-p formulation. This form is applicable in low frequencies (such as earthquakes) with great accuracy. In this thises, this form is used as primery formulation. Because deformation in multiphase problems can be large, in... 

One of the most important problems that challenge the researchers in modeling physical phenomena is the Impact Problem. The complexity of impact problems is due to the fact that this problem consists of various sub-problems, each of which of high complexity and in order to have a clear understanding and correct modeling of the problem, one needs to address each and every one of these problems with great effort, severity and punctuality.Impact problems often involve one or more dynamic systems that can also be subjected to dynamic loading. This loading could be a result of external agents or dynamic interaction of the two bodies with each other. In cases where the problem involves interaction... 

One of the most important issues in modeling natural phenomena that always takes into consideration is the problem of contact and collision between objects. Finite element method is known as the most basic and commonly used in numerical modeling techniques to simulate the above phenomenon.This method has specific problems such as dependency of this approach to the domain mesh especially near the contact region. Due to the dynamic and complex nature of impact problems in which drastic changes occur in short duration that often deals with large deformations, one of the perennial concerns, is the weaknesses of methods applied to enforce contact constrains, and so it is essential to use an... 

In continuum mechanics, the constitutive models are usually based on the Cauchy-Born (CB) hypothesis which seeks the intrinsic characteristics of the material via the atomistic information and it is valid in small deformation. The main purpose of this thesis is to investigate the temperature effect on the stability and size dependency of Cauchy-Born hypothesis and a novel temperature-dependent multi-scale method is developed to investigate the role of temperature on surface effects in the analysis of nano-scale materials. Three-dimensional temperature-related Cauchy-Born formulation are developed for crystalline structure and the stability and size dependency of temperature-related...