Institute of Fundamental Technological Research

This paper deals with the numerical investigation of ellipticity of the boundary value problem for isothermal finite strain elasto-plasticity. Ellipticity can be lost when softening occurs. A discontinuity surface then appears in the considered material body and this is associated with the ill-posedness of the boundary value problem. In the paper the condition for ellipticity loss is derived using the deformation gradient and the first Piola-Kirchhoff stress tensor. Next, the obtained condition is implemented and numerically tested within symbolic-numerical tools AceGen and AceFEM using the benchmark of an elongated rectangular plate with imperfection in plane stress and plane strain conditions.