Analyzing the post-buckling behavior of composite plates is crucial for engineering safety of weight-optimized structures. Such insights ensure the reliability of aerospace and marine components under diverse in-plane loading conditions. The main contribution of the study is investigation of post-buckling behavior of graphene platelets (GPLs) reinforced FG porous plates with geometric imperfections under various non-uniform in-plane loading conditions. Three types of porosity distribution with uniformly distributed GPL reinforcement are included. To characterize the closed cell FG porous material reinforced with GPLs, Halpin-Tsai micromechanical framework is integrated with a Gaussian-random field scheme, while the effective Poisson’s ratio and density are established through the rule of mixtures. The theoretical formulations are based on higher order shear deformation plate theory (HSDT) incorporating von Karman nonlinearities, initial geometric imperfection, and the influence of an underlying elastic foundation. By implementing the Galerkin technique, the analytical solutions for post-buckling equilibrium paths are derived for simply supported boundary conditions. The accuracy of the proposed model is verified by benchmarking the results against existing literature. A comprehensive examination of analysis is performed to elucidate how material constituents and geometric parameters, such as porosity coefficients, GPL weight fractions, and imperfection magnitudes, dictate the post-buckling load-carrying capacity. Furthermore, the study investigates the synergistic effects of various in-plane edge loading conditions and foundation stiffness on the overall structural stability of the plates.
Wang et al. (Fri,) studied this question.