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LS-DYNA
About
LS-DYNA is a general-purpose finite element program capable of simulating complex real world
problems. It is used by the automobile, aerospace, construction, military, manufacturing, and
bioengineering industries. LS-DYNA is optimized for shared and distributed memory Unix, Linux, and
Windows based, platforms, and it is fully QA'd by LSTC. The code's origins lie in highly nonlinear,
transient dynamic finite element analysis using explicit time integration.

"Nonlinear" means at least one (and sometimes all) of the following complications:

Changing boundary conditions (such as contact between parts that changes over time)
Large deformations (for example the crumpling of sheet metal parts)
Nonlinear materials that do not exhibit ideally elastic behavior (for example thermoplastic
polymers)

"Transient dynamic" means analyzing high speed, short duration events where inertial forces are
important. Typical uses include:

Automotive crash (deformation of chassis, airbag inflation, seatbelt tensioning)

Explosions (underwater Naval mine, shaped charges)
Manufacturing (sheet metal stamping)
LS-DYNA's potential applications are numerous and can be tailored to many fields. In a given
simulation, any of LS-DYNA's many features can be combined to model a wide range of physical
events. An example of a simulation, which involves a unique combination of features, is the NASA JPL
Mars Pathfinder landing simulation which simulated the space probe's use of airbags to aid in its
landing. LS-DYNA is one of the most flexible finite element analysis software packages available.
LS-DYNA consists of a single executable file and is entirely command line driven. Therefore all that is
required to run LS-DYNA is a command shell, the executable, an input file, and enough free disk
space to run the calculation. All input files are in simple ASCII format and thus can be prepared using
any text editor. Input files can also be prepared with the instant aid of a graphical preprocessor.

There are many third party software products available for preprocessing LS-DYNA input files. LSTC
also develops its own preprocessor, LS-PrePost, which is freely distributed and runs without a license.
Licensees of LS-DYNA automatically have access to all of the program's capabilities, from simple
linear static mechanical analysis up to advanced thermal and flow solving methods. Furthermore, they
have full use of LS-OPT, a standalone design optimization and probabilistic analysis package with an
interface to LS-DYNA.
 Capabilities
LS-DYNA's analysis capabilities include:

Full 2D & 3D capabilities

Nonlinear dynamics
Rigid body dynamics
Quasi-static simulations
Normal modes
Linear statics
Thermal analysis
Fluid analysis
o Eulerian capabilities
o ALE (Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian)
o FSI (Fluid-Structure Interaction)
o Navier-Stokes fluids
o Compressible fluid solver, CESE (Conservation Element & Solution Element)
FEM-rigid multi-body dynamics coupling (MADYMO, Cal3D)
Underwater shock
Failure analysis
Crack propagation
Real-time acoustics
Implicit springback
Multi-physics coupling
Structural-thermal coupling
Adaptive remeshing
SPH (Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics)
EFG (Element Free Galerkin)
Radiation transport
EM (Electromagnetism)

Material Library
LS-DYNA's material library includes:

Metals
Plastics
Glass
Foams
Fabrics
Elastomers
Honeycombs
Concrete & soils
Viscous fluids
User-defined materials

Element Library
LS-DYNA's element library includes:

Beams (standard, trusses, discrete, cables, and welds) (with over 10 beam element
formulations)
Discrete Elements (springs and dampers)
 Lumped inertias
Lumped masses
Accelerometers
Sensors
Seatbelts
o Pretensioners
o Retractors
o Sliprings
Shells (3, 4, 6, and 8-node including 3D shells, membranes, 2D plane stress, plane strain, and
axisymmetric solids) (with over 25 shell element formulations)
Solids (4 and 10-node tetrahedrons, 6-node pentahedrons, and 8-node hexahedrons) (with
over 20 solid element formulations)
SPH Elements
Thick Shells (8-node)

Contact Algorithms
LS-DYNA's contact algorithms include:

Flexible body contact

Flexible body to rigid body contact
Rigid body to rigid body contact
Edge-to-edge contact
Eroding contact
Tied surfaces
CAD surfaces
Rigid walls
Draw beads
Supported Platforms
Hardware
Proccessor Operating System
AMD Opteron Linux
CRAY XD1 Linux
HP PA-8X00 HP-UX 11.11 and above
HP IA-64 HP-UX 11.22 and above
HP Opteron Linux CP4000/XC
IBM Power 4/5 and 8 Linux, AIX
INTEL IA64 Linux
Linux
INTEL Xeon
Windows 64 bit
NEC SX6 Super-UX
SGI Mips IRIX 6.5 X
SUSE 9 w/Propack 4
SGI IA64
RedHat w/Propack 3
SUN Sparc 5.8 and above
SUN x86-64 5.8 and above
MPI
Vendor O/S HPC Intereconnect MPI Softw
AMD Opteron Linux InfiniBand (SilverStorm), MyriCom, LAM/MPI
 PathScale InfiniPath
HP PA8000 HPUX
HPIA64 HPUX
IBM Power 4/5 and 8 Linux, AIX
Open MPI
INTEL IA32 Linux, Windows InfiniBand (Voltaire), MyriCom
HP MPI, S
Open MPI
INTEL IA64 Linux
HP MPI
Linux x86-64 InfiniBand (Topspin, Voltaire), MyriCom, Open MPI
INTEL Xeon
Windows 64 PathScale InfiniPath HP MPI, I
NEC SX6 Super-UX
SGI Mips IRIX 6.5 X NUMAlink MPT
SUSE 9 w/Propack4 NUMAlink, MPT,
SGI IA64
RedHat w/Propack 3 InfiniBand (Voltaire) Intel MPI,
SUN Sparc 5.8 and above HPC Tool
SUN x86-64 5.8 and above LAM/MPI

Links
LS-DYNA Applications
LS-DYNA Benchmarks (Top Crunch)
LS-DYNA Papers (DYNALOOK)
Copyright 2011 LSTC. LS-DYNA, LS-OPT, and LS-PrePost are registered trademarks of LSTC.