Michael Ortiz
Dotty and Dick Hayman Professor of Aeronautics and Mechanical Engineering

B.S., Polytechnic University of Madrid 1977; M.S., University of California, 1978, Ph.D., 1982

1200 East California Boulevard
Pasadena, CA 91125
MC 105-50

(626) 395-4530
(626) 304-0175 (fax)

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Research

One of Professor Ortiz's interests is computational mechanics, with particular emphasis on nonlinear and failure processes in solids. Some of the current focal areas of research activity within his group include: robust three-dimensional meshing; mesh adaption in strongly nonlinear and transient problems; concurrent computing; multiphysics and multicomponent algorithms; cohesive elements for the simulation of fracture and fragmentation; nonsmooth contact algorithms; variational stress updates; Lagrangian methods in fluid mechanics; and effective constitutive models accounting for microstructures.

Some of the areas of application which are of particular interest to the group and to which the computational tools are being applied are: manufacturing processes, with emphasis on three-dimensional simulation, (machining, drilling, riveting); mechanical properties of materials: ductile/brittle fracture and fragmentation, impact damage to laminated composites, fatigue crack growth, nanoindentation, thin-film delamination; ballistic penetration (including oblique impact, shear banding, and fracture-mediated penetration); and free-surface flows and their interaction with highly deformable structures, e.g., simulation of craneal trauma.

Selected Publications

Nanovoid Deformation in Aluminum Under Simple Shear (with J. Marian and J. Knap) Acta Materialia, 53:2893­2900, 2005

A Cohesive Approach to Thin-Shell Fracture and Fragmentation (F. Cirak and A. Pandolfi) J. Comput. Meth. Appl. Mech. Eng., 194, 2604­2618, 2005

A Class of Variational Strain-Localization Finite Elements (with Q. Yang Q and A. Mota) Int. J. Numer. Meth. Eng., 62:1013­1037, 2005

A Multi-Phase Field Model of Planar Dislocation Networks (with M. Koslowski) Model Simul. Mater. Sci. Eng., 12:1087­1097, 2004

Microstructure Evolution in the Equal Channel Angular Extrusion Process (with S. M. Sivakumar) J. Comput. Meth. Appl. Mech. Eng., 193 (2004) 5177­5194

Density-Functional-Theory-Based Local Quasicontinuum Method: Prediction of Dislocation Nucleation (with M. Fago, R. L. Hayes, and E. A. Carter) Physical Review, B 70:100102-1‹100102-4, 2004

Nanovoid Cavitation by Dislocation Emission in Aluminum (with J. Marian and J. Knap) Physical Review, 93:165503-1‹165503-4, 2004

Universal Binding-Energy Relation for Crystals that Accounts for Surface Relaxation (with R. L. Hayes and E. A. Carter) Physical Review, B 69:172104-1‹172104-4, 2004

For detailed research information and a complete list of publications, please visit Professor Ortiz's Computational Solid Mechanics Group site.