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The exponentiated Hencky-logarithmic strain energy. Part II: Coercivity, planar polyconvexity and existence of minimizers

We consider a family of isotropic volumetric-isochoric decoupled strain energies $$ F\mapsto W_{\rm eH}(F):=\widehat{W}_{\rm eH}(U):=\left\{\begin{array}{lll} \fracμ{k}\,e^{k\,\|{\rm dev}_n\log {U}\|^2}+\fracκ{2\hat{k}}\,e^{\hat{k}\,[{\rm tr}(\log U)]^2}&\text{if}& {\rm det}\, F>0,\\ +\infty &\text{if} &{\rm det} F\leq 0, \end{array}\right.\quad $$ based on the Hencky-logarithmic (true, natural) strain tensor $\log U$, where $μ>0$ is the infinitesimal shear modulus, $κ=\frac{2μ+3λ}{3}>0$ is the infinitesimal bulk modulus with $λ$ the first Lamé constant, $k,\hat{k}$ are dimensionless parameters, $F=\nabla φ$ is the gradient of deformation, $U=\sqrt{F^T F}$ is the right stretch tensor and ${\rm dev}_n\log {U} =\log {U}-\frac{1}{n} {\rm tr}(\log {U})\cdot 1\!\!1$ is the deviatoric part (the projection onto the traceless tensors) of the strain tensor $\log U$. For small elastic strains the energies reduce to first order to the classical quadratic Hencky energy $$ F\mapsto W{_{\rm H}}(F):=\widehat{W}_{_{\rm H}}(U):=μ\,\|{\rm dev}_n\log U\|^2+\fracκ{2}\,[{\rm tr}(\log U)]^2, $$ which is known to be not rank-one convex. The main result in this paper is that in plane elastostatics the energies of the family $W_{_{\rm eH}}$ are polyconvex for $k\geq \frac{1}{3}$, $\widehat{k}\geq \frac{1}{8}$, extending a previous finding on its rank-one convexity. Our method uses a judicious application of Steigmann's polyconvexity criteria based on the representation of the energy in terms of the principal invariants of the stretch tensor $U$. These energies also satisfy suitable growth and coercivity conditions. We formulate the equilibrium equations and we prove the existence of minimizers by the direct methods of the calculus of variations.