Fundamentals of kinematic hardening hyperplasticity

We present a hyperplastic (thermomechanical) framework for the modelling of kinematic hardening of plastic materials. The advantage of this approach i s that it allows a compact development of plasticity theories, which are gu aranteed to obey thermodynamic principles. Starting with a model which empl oys a single kinematically hardening yield surface, we generalize this firs t to multiple surfaces and then to the case of an infinite number of yield surfaces. At each stage of generalization! the link with conventional plast icity is demonstrated, and examples of one- and multidimensional hyperplast ic models are presented, together with their interpretation in terms of con ventional plasticity theory. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights rese rved.