Edinburgh Napier University

  This work introduces a novel unified finite element framework for computational solid mechanics based on quadratic Bézier triangular and tetrahedral elements that can be readily generated by exploiting the existing mesh generators for quadratic Lagrange elements. New B̄ and F̄ elements and two new mixed elements, BT2/BT0 and BT2/BT1, are introduced for dealing with the issues associated with volumetric and shear locking as well as for performing computationally efficient explicit elastodynamics simulations of problems modelled with nearly incompressible elastic and elastoplastic material models. By successfully simulating challenging benchmark examples, it is shown that the proposed work offers a simple unified finite element framework that is robust, accurate and computationally very efficient for performing the simulations of a wide variety of challenging problems in solid mechanics.