Influence of Porosity on the Flexural and Free Vibration Responses of Functionally Graded Plates in Thermal Environment

This paper examines the influence of porosities on the flexural and free vibration response of functionally graded material (FGM) plates based on the authors’ recently developed non-polynomial higher-order shear and normal deformation theory. The theory accommodates the nonlinear variation in the in-plane and transverse displacements in the thickness coordinates. It also contains the hyperbolic shear strain shape function in the displacement field with only four unknowns. A new mathematical model has also been proposed to incorporate the effects of porosity in the FGM plate. Various numerical examples have been solved to ascertain the accuracy, efficiency, and applicability of the present formulation. The effects of porosity, volume fraction index, plate thickness, aspect ratio, boundary conditions and temperature have been discussed in details. The obtained results can be treated as a benchmark for future studies.