First-Order Compatible-Strain Mixed Quadrilateral Finite Elements for 2D Nonlinear Elasticity

Abstract: Compatible-strain mixed finite elements (CSMFEs) use the differential complex of nonlinear elasticity to construct discretizations that preserve the underlying topological structure. Existing CSMFEs have focused on simplicial meshes for compressible and incompressible nonlinear elasticity. In this paper, we develop compatible-strain mixed formulations for quadrilateral elements applicable to both compressible and incompressible solids. For general quadrilateral elements, the Piola transformation preserves vector fields tangent and normal to element edges only for special geometries, such as rectangles, parallelograms, and trapezoids, and therefore cannot be used to construct compatible shape functions. To overcome this limitation, the shape functions are computed directly in the physical space using numerical integration. Nedelec shape functions of the first kind are employed to interpolate the displacement gradient, and a new class of stress shape functions compatible with the displacement and displacement-gradient discretizations is introduced. The compressible formulation follows the framework previously developed for simplicial CSMFEs, whereas a new incompressible formulation employing element-level condensation of the pressure field is proposed, thereby avoiding additional global degrees of freedom. These developments extend the compatible-strain mixed finite element framework from simplicial to general quadrilateral meshes for both compressible and incompressible nonlinear elasticity. Numerical examples demonstrate that the proposed quadrilateral elements can solve problems that require second-order simplicial CSMFEs while using fewer degrees of freedom.