FAMU-FSU College of Engineering
Tallahassee, FL 32303, USA

Physical Interpretation of the Virial Stress

Leon van Dommelen


Abstract:

The virial stress is rederived using only fundamental physics, in order to better understand its meaning. Despite recent claims to the contrary, it is found that when properly applied, the virial stress produces the desired macroscopic stress, and that the dynamical term in it does represent physical forces between adjacent material regions.