Young's modulus

Young's modulus, also known as the elastic modulus, is a measure of the stiffness of
a solid material. It is a mechanical property of linear elastic solid materials. It defines
the relationship between stress (force per unit area) and strain (proportional
deformation) in a material. Young's modulus is named after the 19th-century British
scientist Thomas Young. However, the concept was developed in 1727 by Leonhard
Euler, and the first experiments that used the concept of Young's modulus in its
current form were performed by the Italian scientist Giordano Riccati in 1782, pre-
dating Young's work by 25 years.[1] The term modulus is the diminutive of the Latin
Rubber, a material with an extremely
term modus which means measure.
low Young's modulus
A solid material will deform when a load is applied to it. If it returns to its original
shape after the load is removed, this is called elastic deformation. In the range where
the ratio between load and deformation remains constant, the stress–strain curve is linear. Not many materials are linear and elastic
beyond a small amount of deformation. A stiff material needs more force to deform compared to a soft material, and an infinite force
would be needed to deform a perfectly rigid material, implying that it would have an infinite Young's modulus. Although such a
oung's modulus can be approximated as rigid.[2]
material cannot exist, a material with a very high Y

Material stiffness should not be confused with:

Strength: the strength of material is the amount of force it can withstand and still recover its original shape;
Geometric stiffness: the geometric stiffness depends on shape, e.g. the bending stif fness of an I beam is much higher
than that of a rod made of the same steel, thus having the same rigidity, and same mass of material per length;
Hardness: the hardness of a material defines the relative resistance that its surface imposes against the penetration
of a harder body;
Toughness: toughness is the amount of energy that a material can absorb before fracture.

Contents
Technical
Units
United States

Usage
Linear versus non-linear
Directional materials
Calculation
Force exerted by stretched or contracted material
Elastic potential energy
Relation among elastic constants
Approximate values
See also
References
Further reading
External links

Technical
The technical definition is: the ratio of the stress (force per unit area) along an axis to the strain (ratio of deformation over initial
length) along that axis in the range of stress in whichHooke's law holds.[3]

Units
Young's modulus is the ratio of stress (which has units of pressure) to strain (which is dimensionless), and so Young's modulus has
units of pressure. Its SI unit is therefore the pascal (Pa or N/m2 or kg·m−1·s−2). The practical units used are megapascals (MPa or
N/mm2) or gigapascals (GPa or kN/mm2).

United States
In United States customary units, it is expressed as pounds (force) per square inch (psi). The abbreviation ksi refers to kips per square
inch. A "kip" is an Imperial unit of force and is equal to 1000 pounds-force, making a ksi equal to 1000 psi.

Usage
The Young's modulus enables the calculation of the change in the dimension of a bar made of an isotropic elastic material under
tensile or compressive loads. For instance, it predicts how much a material sample extends under tension or shortens under
compression. The Young's modulus directly applies to cases of uniaxial stress, that is tensile or compressive stress in one direction and
no stress in the other directions. Young's modulus is also used in order to predict the deflection that will occur in a statically
determinate beam when a load is applied at a point in between the beam's supports. Other elastic calculations usually require the use
of one additional elastic property, such as the shear modulus, bulk modulus or Poisson's ratio. Any two of these parameters are
sufficient to fully describe elasticity in an isotropic material.

Linear versus non-linear

Young's modulus represents the factor of proportionality in Hooke's law, which relates the stress and the strain. However, Hooke's law
is only valid under the assumption of an elastic and linear response. Any real material will eventually fail and break when stretched
over a very large distance or with a very large force; however all solid materials exhibit nearly Hookean behavior for small enough
strains or stresses. If the range over which Hooke's law is valid is large enough compared to the typical stress that one expects to apply
to the material, the material is said to be linear. Otherwise (if the typical stress one would apply is outside the linear range) the
material is said to be non-linear.

Steel, carbon fiber and glass among others are usually considered linear materials, while other materials such as rubber and soils are
non-linear. However, this is not an absolute classification: if very small stresses or strains are applied to a non-linear material, the
response will be linear, but if very high stress or strain is applied to a linear material, the linear theory will not be enough. For
example, as the linear theory implies reversibility, it would be absurd to use the linear theory to describe the failure of a steel bridge
under a high load; although steel is a linear material for most applications, it is not in such a case of catastrophic failure.

In solid mechanics, the slope of the stress–strain curve at any point is called the tangent modulus. It can be experimentally determined
from the slope of a stress–strain curve created duringtensile tests conducted on a sample of the material.

Directional materials
Young's modulus is not always the same in all orientations of a material. Most metals and ceramics, along with many other materials,
are isotropic, and their mechanical properties are the same in all orientations. However, metals and ceramics can be treated with
certain impurities, and metals can be mechanically worked to make their grain structures directional. These materials then become
anisotropic, and Young's modulus will change depending on the direction of the force vector. Anisotropy can be seen in many
composites as well. For example, carbon fiber has a much higher Young's modulus (is much stiffer) when force is loaded parallel to
the fibers (along the grain). Other such materials include wood and reinforced concrete. Engineers can use this directional
phenomenon to their advantage in creating structures.
Calculation
Young's modulus E, can be calculated by dividing the tensile stress, , by the engineering extensional strain, , in the elastic
(initial, linear) portion of the physicalstress–strain curve:

where

E is the Young's modulus (modulus of elasticity)

F is the force exerted on an object under tension;
A is the actual cross-sectional area, which equals the area of the cross-section perpendicular
to the applied force;
ΔL is the amount by which the length of the object changes (ΔL is positive if the material is
stretched , and negative when the material is compressed);
L0 is the original length of the object.

Force exerted by stretched or contracted material

The Young's modulus of a material can be used tocalculate the force it exerts under specific strain.

where F is the force exerted by the material when contracted or stretched byΔL.

Hooke's law for a stretched wire can be derived from this formula:

where it comes in saturation

and

But note that the elasticity of coiled springs comes fromshear modulus, not Young's modulus.

Elastic potential energy

The elastic potential energy stored in a linear elastic material is given by the integral of the Hooke's law:

now by expliciting the intensive variables:

This means that the elastic potential energy density (i.e., per unit volume) is given by:
or, in simple notation, for a linear elastic material: , since the strain is defined .

In a nonlinear elastic material the Young modulus is a function of the strain, so the second equivalence no longer holds and the elastic
energy is not a quadratic function of the strain:

Relation among elastic constants

For homogeneous isotropic materials simple relations exist between elastic constants (Young's modulus E, shear modulus G, bulk
modulus K, and Poisson's ratio ν) that allow calculating them all as long as two are known:

Approximate values
Young's modulus can vary somewhat due to differences in
sample composition and test method. The rate of
deformation has the greatest impact on the data collected,
especially in polymers. The values here are approximate and
only meant for relative comparison.

Influences of selected glass component additions on

Young's modulus of a specific base glass
 Approximate Young's modulus for various materials
Material GPa Mpsi

Rubber (small strain) 0.01–0.1[4] 1.45–14.5 × 10−3

Low-density polyethylene[5] 0.11–0.86 1.6–6.5 × 10−2

Diatom frustules (largely silicic acid)[6] 0.35–2.77 0.05–0.4

PTFE (Teflon) 0.5[4] 0.075

HDPE 0.8 0.116

Bacteriophage capsids[7] 1–3 0.15–0.435

Polypropylene 1.5–2[4] 0.22–0.29

Polyethylene terephthalate(PET) 2–2.7[4] 0.29–0.39

Nylon 2–4 0.29–0.58

Polystyrene, solid 3–3.5[4] 0.44–0.51

0.00036–
Polystyrene, foam[8] 0.0025–0.007
0.00102

Medium-density fiberboard(MDF)[9] 4 0.58

Wood (along grain) 11[4] 1.60

Human Cortical Bone[10] 14 2.03

Glass-reinforced polyester matrix[11] 17.2 2.49

Aromatic peptide nanotubes[12][13] 19–27 2.76–3.92

High-strength concrete 30[4] 4.35

Amino-acid molecular crystals[14] 21–44 3.04–6.38

Carbon fiber reinforced plastic(50/50 fibre/matrix, biaxial fabric) 30–50[15] 4.35–7.25

Hemp fiber[16] 35 5.08

Magnesium metal (Mg) 45[4] 6.53

Glass (see chart) 50–90[4] 7.25–13.1

Flax fiber[17] 58 8.41

Aluminum 69[4] 10

Mother-of-pearl (nacre, largely calcium carbonate)[18] 70 10.2

Aramid[19] 70.5–112.4 10.2–16.3

Tooth enamel (largely calcium phosphate)[20] 83 12

Stinging nettle fiber[21] 87 12.6

Bronze 96–120[4] 13.9–17.4

Brass 100–125[4] 14.5–18.1

Titanium (Ti) 110.3 16[4]

Titanium alloys 105–120[4] 15–17.5

Copper (Cu) 117 17

Carbon fiber reinforced plastic(70/30 fibre/matrix, unidirectional, along
181 26.3
fibre)[22]

Silicon Single crystal, different directions[23][24] 130–185 18.9–26.8

Wrought iron 190–210[4] 27.6–30.5

Steel (ASTM-A36) 209[4] 29

polycrystalline Yttrium iron garnet (YIG)[25] 193 28

single-crystal Yttrium iron garnet (YIG)[26] 200 29

Cobalt-chrome (CoCr)[27] 220–258 29

Aromatic peptide nanospheres[28] 230–275 33.4–40

Beryllium (Be)[29] 287 41.6

329–
Molybdenum (Mo) 47.7–47.9
330[4][30][31]

Tungsten (W) 400–410[4] 58–59

Silicon carbide (SiC) 450[4] 65

Tungsten carbide (WC) 450–650[4] 65–94

Osmium (Os) 525–562[32] 76.1–81.5

Single-walled carbon nanotube 1,000+[33][34] 150+

Graphene (C) 1050[35] 152

Diamond (C) 1050–1210[36] 152–175

Carbyne (C)[37] 32100[38] 4,660

See also
Bending stiffness
Deflection
Deformation
Flexural modulus
Hooke's law
Impulse excitation technique
List of materials properties
Yield (engineering)

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Further reading
ASTM E 111, "Standard Test Method for Young's Modulus, Tangent Modulus, and Chord Modulus"
The ASM Handbook (various volumes) contains Young's Modulus for various materials and information on
calculations. Online version (subscription required)

External links
Matweb: free database of engineering properties for over 115,000 materials
Young's Modulus for groups of materials, andtheir cost
 Conversion formulas
Homogeneous isotropic linear elastic materials have their elastic properties uniquely determined by any two moduli
among these; thus, given any two, any other of the elastic moduli can be calculated according to these formulas.
Notes

There are two valid solutions.

The plus sign leads to .
The minus sign leads to
.

Cannot be used when

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