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The book presents foundations of the micropolar continuum mechanics including a short but comprehensive introduction of stress and strain measures, derivation of motion equations and discussion of the difference between Cosserat and classical (Cauchy) continua, and the discussion of more specific problems related to the constitutive modeling, i.e. constitutive inequalities, symmetry groups, acceleration waves, etc.

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Kinematics of Micropolar Continuum. - Stress and Couple Stress Tensors in Micropolar Continuum. - Constitutive Equations. - Strong Ellipticity and Acceleration Waves. - Elements of Tensor Analysis. - Elements of Rigid Body Dynamics. - Elements of Mechanics of Elastic Rods. - Micropolar Plates and Shells as Two-dimensional Cosserat Continuum

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From the reviews:
"This book is devoted to the mechanics of micropolar continua or, with other words, to the mechanics of Cosserat continua. ... The book updates already published books by using some recent results. ... The book could be useful to specialists working in the field of Cosserat continua or other generalized continua." (M. Marin, Zentralblatt MATH, Vol. 1257, 2013)

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Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Holm Altenbach lehrt Technische Mechanik an der Otto-von-Guericke-Universität Magdeburg. Seine Forschungsschwerpunkte liegen auf verschiedenen Gebieten der Kontinuumsmechanik (Plattentheorie, Kriechschädigungsmechanik, Mechanik der Komposite).

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