The TDNNS method for Reissner-Mindlin plates

A new family of locking-free finite elements for shear deformable Reissner-Mindlin plates is presented. The elements are based on the "tangential-displacement normal-normal-stress" formulation of elasticity. In this formulation, the bending moments are treated as separate unknowns. The degrees of freedom for the plate element are the nodal values of the deflection, tangential components of the rotations and normal-normal components of the bending strain. Contrary to other plate bending elements, no special treatment for the shear term such as reduced integration is necessary. The elements attain an optimal order of convergence.