ME 546 Applications of Solid Mechanics

Linear elasticity is the rigorous version of the mechanics of materials you saw in undergrad: instead of starting from beam formulas and stress concentration factors, you build everything from the strain-displacement, compatibility, and equilibrium equations and then actually solve the resulting boundary value problems. You'll work through both displacement-based and stress-based formulations on classical geometries (thick-walled cylinders, spinning disks, Airy stress functions, Timoshenko beams, noncircular torsion), with the load carried by five quizzes plus homework and a small research project. It's the analytical foundation for almost any later solid mechanics elective, plasticity, fracture, contact, FEM theory, so the goal is less about memorizing solutions and more about learning to set up and close elasticity problems cleanly.