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RESEARCH PRODUCT

The effect of plasticity in crumpling of thin sheets

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Bridging the gap between theoretical and experimental work to understand the effect of plasticity on the crumpling of thin sheets into a small volume has proved difficult. A realistic numerical model now makes a distinction between elastic and elasto-plastic behaviour. Crumpling a thin sheet of material into a small volume requires energy for creating a network of deformations such as vertices and ridges1,2. Scaling properties of a single elastic vertex3,4,5 or ridge have been analysed theoretically6,7,8, and crumpling of a sheet by numerical simulations1,9,10. Real materials are however elasto-plastic11,12,13,14,15 and large local strains induce irreversible plastic deformations. Hence, a numerical model that can be purely elastic or elasto-plastic is introduced. In crumpled elastic sheets, the ridge patterns are found to be similar, independent of the width to thickness (L/h) ratio of the sheet, and the fractal dimension of crumpled sheets is given by scaling properties of the energy and average length of ridges. In crumpled elasto-plastic sheets, such a similarity does not appear as the L/h ratio affects the deformations, and the fractal dimension (Dpl) is thereby reduced. Evidence is also found of Dpl not being universal but dependent on the plastic yield point of the material.