Nonlinear thermo- electro-mechanical dynamic response of shear deformable piezoelectric sigmoid functionally graded sandwich circular cylindrical shells on elastic foundations

In this paper, we study the nonlinear dynamic response of higher order shear deformable sandwich functionally graded circular cylindrical shells with outer surface-bonded piezoelectric actuator on elastic foundations subjected to thermo-electro-mechanical and damping loads. The sigmoid functionally graded material shells are made of the metal–ceramic–metal layers with temperature-dependent material properties. The governing equations are established based on Reddy’s third-order shear deformation theory using the stress function, the Galerkin method and the fourth-order Runge–Kutta method. Numerical results are given to demonstrate the influence of geometrical parameters, material properties, imperfection, elastic foundations, and thermo-electro-mechanical and damping loads on the nonlinear dynamic response of the shells. Accuracy of the present formulation is shown by comparing the results of numerical examples with the ones available in literature.