The objective of this paper is the efficient modeling of thin-walled structures and their interaction with fluids. Instead of using dimensionally reduced plate or shell elements, a numerical approach to model plate- or shell-like structures with anisotropic high-order finite hexahedral elements is presented. With an appropriate variation of the polynomial degrees for the different local directions of the elements, an efficient spatial discretization of a structural dynamic problem can be found. In this way, the additional costs of the fully three-dimensional model compared to dimensionally reduced formulations can be compensated. This approach is demonstrated with a coupled fluid-structure interaction example. An accuracy problem arising due to the load transfer using bilinear mapping is addressed and an improved approach based on a composed integration scheme is proposed.     «

The objective of this paper is the efficient modeling of thin-walled structures and their interaction with fluids. Instead of using dimensionally reduced plate or shell elements, a numerical approach to model plate- or shell-like structures with anisotropic high-order finite hexahedral elements is presented. With an appropriate variation of the polynomial degrees for the different local directions of the elements, an efficient spatial discretization of a structural dynamic problem can be found....     »