This Civil Engineering Course under the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) on the broad subject of Solids, Materials and their Mechanics has been developed by Indian Institute of Technology’s and the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore as a collaborative project supported by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (Government of India) to enhance the quality of engineering education in the country, by developing curriculum based video and web courses. In these web based lectures, the authors have developed the subject in detail and in stages in a student-friendly manner.

The broad group of Solids, Materials and their Mechanics is structured into video lectures and lecture notes along the following eight topics:

• Strength of Materials: The video lectures on the topic by IIT Delhi outlines the basic theories and principles on Strength of Materials, the study of the internal effect of external forces applied to structural member. Analysis of Stress and Strain, Stress-Strain Relations, Uniaxial Loading, Torsion, Bending of Beams, Deflection of Beams, Combined Stresses, Stability of Columns and Springs are some of the topics covered in this subject. View this course on the NPTEL website here
• Building Materials and Construction: The video lecture series on Building Materials and Construction by IIT Delhi includes Functions of Buildings, Role of Material in Construction, Concrete, Concrete Production, Cement, Role of Mix Parameters, Role of Admixtures, Segregation & Bleeding, Strength of Concrete, Mechanical Properties of Concrete, Durability of Concrete, Cement Aggregate and Water Selection, Mix Design of Concrete, Masonry, Walls, Metal Fundamentals, Steel, Polymer in Construction, Glass and Timber, Roof and Floor Construction. View this course on the NPTEL website here
• Mechanics of Solids: The lecture notes on the subject by IIT Delhi deal with the topics of Analysis of Stress, Analysis of Strain, Stress-Strain Relations, Uniaxial, Torsion, Bending, Buckling of Columns, Combined Stresses, Energy Method, Theories of Yielding and Failure. View the lecture notes on the NPTEL website here. The video lecture series on the topic is available on the NPTEL website here
• Composite Materials: The video lecture series by the IISc Bangalore should enable the students at the end of the course to have good appreciation of this new emerging material and its application potential in Civil Engineering. The analysis and design procedures of composite material structures are considerably more complex than those of their metallic counterparts owing to their anisotropic nature. This course aims to provide the basic knowledge and understanding of the mechanics of composite materials so as to achieve safe and reliable composite structural systems. The course deals with Constituents of Composites, Types of Fibres and Matrices, Stress-Strain Relations of Lamina in Plane Stress, Laminate Nomenclature/ Notations, Manufacturing Processes, Typical Joints in Composites, Macro-mechanics of Lamina, Macro-mechanics of Laminate, Laminate Failure Mechanics, Composite Fabrication Process and Stress-resultants in Laminates. View this course syllabus on the NPTEL website here
• Advanced Solid Mechanics: This course by IIT Chennai introduces the fundamental concepts and principles in the analysis of solids to the undergraduate students, postgraduate students and teachers of Civil Engineering. Most of the problems that are solved are essentially one dimensional in nature. In this course a general theory available to study the response of solids to applied forces is developed and used to study simple boundary value problems. In all, the treatment is three dimensional. The aim of the course material is to inculcate in the reader some of the available tools to analyze a structure and to elucidate the simplifying assumptions made to make the structure analyzable. The course material is self contained in that all the required mathematical tools are also covered in adequate detail. Where possible, comparison of the 3D elasticity solutions to boundary value problems and simplified solutions is presented. A number of problems are solved to illustrate how the learnt concepts and help solve problems of interest. Also exercise problems with different levels of difficulty have been included. The contents of the course include:
  • Introduction to mechanics of solids - need and basic concepts.
  • Introduction to tensor algebra and calculus, kinematics, strain displacement relationship, compatibility conditions, concept of traction and stress,
  • Equilibrium equations, constitutive relations, formulation of boundary value problems in linearized elasticity, solution of 2D problems using Airy's stress functions.
  • Solution to boundary value problems corresponding to end torsion of prismatic beams, bending of prismatic straight and curved beams, beams on elastic foundation. 

View the references, additional readings and related links at the NPTEL website here. The syllabus of the same course offered by IIT Bombay can be viewed at the NPTEL website here.

• Applied Elasticity for Engineers: The course by IISc and University of Bangalore for the postgraduate and senior undergraduate students in Civil, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering aims to understand the behavior of elastic solids under given applied loads and also the limitations of the results given by the Elementary Mechanics of Materials. The contents of the course provide the essential fundamental knowledge of the subject matter with compilation of solutions that are required in engineering practice and design. In particular, the large number of problems worked out and a variety of problems given as exercise at the end of each topic are of help to the students and engineers in gaining a good insight into the subject. The course syllabus can be viewed at the NPTEL website here
• Modern Construction Materials: This course by IIT Roorkee introduces the fundamental concepts of structure, mechanics and properties of various modern construction materials. The contents of the course include - Structure of materials, Properties of materials, Failure and fracture of materials, Cement Concrete, Asphalt concrete, Steel, Polymers and composites, Glass. View the syllabus and details of references at the NPTEL website here. The same course as offered by IIT Madras covers the fundamentals of materials science including the formation of chemical bonds, the properties of the states of matter, the development and the basic characteristics of the structure of materials, phase diagrams, concepts of rheology, mechanical behavior and simple failure models, deterministic and stochastic fracture mechanics and the treatment of composites. The construction materials treated in the course include bricks and stone, metals and alloys, wood and wood products, concrete and other cement‐based materials, and asphalt. The details of the course are available at the NPTEL website here
• Continuum Damage Mechanics: This course by IISc Bangalore is a newly emerging area of Solid Mechanics. Continuum Mechanics deals with an ideal continuum on one hand whereas Fracture Mechanics deals with existing cracks at macroscopic scale. The deterioration of the material before the manifestation of a macroscopic crack can be explained through the concept of Continuum Damage Mechanics (CDM). The main purpose of the course is to provide a basic introduction of CDM to the post-graduate students. The course deals with a review of essential solid mechanics concepts, indicial notations and tensors, review of plasticity concepts, thermodynamics and micromechanics of damage, kinetic laws of damage evolution and analysis of structures considering damage. View details of this course at the NPTEL website here