Vibration analysis of radially FGM sectorial plates of variable thickness on elastic foundations

This paper deals with free vibration analysis of radially functionally graded circular and annular sectorial thin plates of variable thickness, resting on the Pasternak elastic foundation. Differential quadrature method (DQM) is used to yield natural frequencies of the circular/annular sectorial plates under simply-supported and clamped boundary conditions on the basis of the classical plate theory (CPT). The inhomogeneity of the plate is characterized by taking exponential variation of Young’s modulus and mass density of the material along the radial direction whereas Poisson’s ratio is assumed to remain constant. The validity of the present solution is first examined by studying the convergence of the frequency parameters. Then, a comparison of results with those available in literature confirms the excellent accuracy of the present approach. Afterwards, the frequency parameters of the circular/annular sectorial thin plates with uniform, linear, and quadratic variations in thickness are computed for different boundary conditions and various values of the material inhomogeneity constants, sector angles, and inner to outer radius ratios.