• ANALYTICAL SOLUTION OF CONTACT PROBLEM FOR NANOMATERIAL WITH SURFACE TENSION

Abstract

Consideration the effects of surface tension on the elastic field of solid material has applications in several modern problems in solid mechanics. This paper proposes an application of surface elasticity theory in the analysis of contact problem at nano-scale. The Fourier integral transform method is adopted to derive the fundamental solutions for contact problem with surface tension effects. As a special case, the deformation induced by normal triangle distribution force is discussed in detail. The results indicate some interesting characteristics in nano-mechanics, which are distinctly different from those in classical contact problem. The results show that the hardness of material depends strongly on the surface tension. This study is helpful to characterize and measure the mechanical properties of soft materials through nanoindentation.