Dynamic modulus 2026-10-18
The dynamic modulus is the complex stress-amplitude to strain-amplitude ratio in steady oscillatory response. With the convention , the real part is the storage modulus and the imaginary part is the loss modulus. For , . The average supplied power is , fixing the loss-sign convention. The elastic coefficient is a shear or extension modulus according to the deformation measured; it is unrelated to the complex modulus meaning absolute value of a complex number.
Elastomer 2026-10-18
An elastomer is a polymeric material capable of large substantially recoverable deformation. Flexible chain segments supply configurational entropy, while a network of permanent or sufficiently long-lived cross-links prevents unrestricted macroscopic flow on the observation time scale. Its dynamic modulus depends on whether segmental relaxation can follow the imposed deformation. The rubbery plateau and high-frequency glassy response refer to different accessible relaxation regimes.
The requested model is the standard linear solid model: a spring of modulus in parallel with a Maxwell branch consisting of a spring in series with a dashpot of viscosity . Both parallel branches have the same strain; their stresses add. In the Maxwell branch the spring and dashpot have the same stress and their strains add. The equilibrium spring prevents indefinite flow at long times.
For harmonic strain , define the dynamic modulus by . The Maxwell branch has compliance . Defining therefore gives
The same mechanical model can represent a shear modulus if the appropriate shear stresses and strains are used consistently.
Figure 1.
A spring parallel to a Maxwell element gives finite low- and high-frequency storage moduli and one loss-modulus peak
. Details.
Writing , its storage modulus and loss modulus are
With this time convention the physical stress is and leads the strain by the loss angle. The dissipated energy per unit volume per cycle is . Thus describes elastic storage and describes dissipation.
At low frequency, , the dashpot flows during a cycle and relaxes the Maxwell spring, leaving , . At high frequency, , the dashpot hardly deforms within a cycle, so both springs carry elastic load: , while . The loss modulus is maximal at , with peak value .
The equivalent constitutive equation is
After a sudden strain is imposed and held, the stress relaxes as . It falls from the instantaneous modulus to the nonzero relaxed modulus . This single-time relaxation is the simplest improvement over a purely elastic solid or a Maxwell fluid with zero long-time modulus.
The loss tangent is . Its maximum need not coincide with the loss-modulus maximum: the peak frequencies in a standard linear solid give for the loss tangent. The model captures one viscoelastic crossover between two finite elastic plateaux, with dissipation concentrated near the relaxation frequency.
The dynamic modulus, or complex viscoelastic modulus, is the ratio of complex stress amplitude to complex strain amplitude in the periodic steady response:
This defines the sign convention; for passive response the loss modulus is nonnegative at positive frequency. A Newtonian fluid obeys , while a Hooke's law solid obeys . Hence
The first is purely dissipative and the second purely elastic. Here denotes the scalar deformation used in the problem, with any shear-versus-extension geometric factors already included in its modulus and viscosity.