A continuum theory and numerical procedure for chemo-mechanical coupling behavior

Many continuum media, often described asmultifunctional materials, exhibit multi-field coupling behavior and aresensitive to external environmental stimuli. Chemo-mechanical couplingbehavior for continuum media was investigated in this paper. From the pointview of the thermodynamics and chemical potential, we have obtained theconstitutive equations and governing equations of chemo-mechanical couplingproblem. Energy functional of chemo-mechanical coupling equations has beenestablished by variational principle, and then the equivalent integrationforms and finite element formulation of the coupled governing equations arederived. The chemo-mechanical coupling behaviors of continuum media areanalyzed by numerical examples. The numerical results show that themechanical and chemical fields interact with each other in a medium. Thedeformation of media is caused by the concentration variation. Similarly,the external mechanical force can also induce concentration redistribution.The basic theory and simulation method can be applied to analysis ofchemo-mechanical coupling behavior of continuum media. The chemo-mechanicalcoupling behavior of continuum media can be reflected clearly in the presentmodel.