Formulation of elastic multi-structures

Based on the creative and groundbreaking work done by Feng and Shi, some further work has been carried out comprehensively by the first author on the formulation of elastic multi-structures. The main contribution of this paper can be summarized as follows: The work of Feng and Shi has been extended to an elastic multi-structures with nonlinear structural element: shell in both linear and nonlinear case. Three general combinations of multi-structures have been formulated, that is, Case 1: linear elements of 3-D body, 1-D bar/beam, 2-D plates and 2-D shell; Case 2: nonlinear elements of 3-D body, 1-D bar/beam, 2-D plates and 2-D shell; and Case 3: the linear-nonlinear mix problem of 3-D body (nonlinear), 1-D bar/beam (linear), 2-D plates (linear) and 2-D shell (linear). From the investigation, it has proved that the higher dimensional element will have a strong influence on the lower one with the inner linkage boundaries, and also proved that solution uniqueness of elastic multi-structures is different from a single 3-D body.