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PREFACE
Strength of materials is a basic engineering subject that
must be understood by anyone concerned with the strength and
physical performance of structures, whatever those structures are
man-made or natural.
The subject matter includes such fundamental concepts as
stresses and strains, deformations and displacements, elasticity
and inelasticity, strain energy, and load-carrying capacity.
These concepts underlie the design and analysis of a huge
variety of mechanical and structural systems. At the college level,
mechanics of materials is usually taught during the sophomore
and junior years.
The subject is required for most students majoring in
mechanical, structural, civil, biomedical, aeronautical, and
aerospace engineering. Furthermore, studying this subject can
also be found useful by majority of students from such diverse
fields as materials science, industrial engineering, architecture,
and agricultural engineering.
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