THE NUMBER OF ELASTIC-MODULI FOR ANISOTROPIC POLYNOMIAL CONSTITUTIVE-EQUATIONS

This paper shows how to compute the number of elastic moduli for polyn omial anisotropic constitutive equations. We investigate the algebraic structure of constitutive equations and we show that the knowledge of the number of elasticities for five types of anisotropy (described by cyclic groups) permits to determine the number of elasticities for al l other symmetry groups relevant for elasticity theory. We compute the numbers of elastic moduli for polynomial constitutive relations of de gree less than or equal to 6. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.