Analysis of plates and laminates using the natural neighbour radial point interpolation method

In this work the natural neighbour radial point interpolation method (NNRPIM) is extended for the analysis of thick plates and laminates. In order to define the displacement field and the strain field the Reissner–Mindlin plate theory is considered. The nodal connectivity and the node dependent integration background mesh are constructed resorting to the Voronoï tessellation and to the Delaunay triangulation. Within NNRPIM the obtained shape functions pass through all nodes inside the influence-cell providing shape functions with the delta Kronecker property. Optimization tests and examples of well-known benchmark examples are solved in order to prove the high accuracy and convergence rate of the proposed method.