Monotonicity of isotropic tensor functions on the set of symmetric matrices: completing Rodney Hill's generalization of the Chandler Davis convexity theorem

Abstract

Motivated by classical constitutive inequalities in isotropic nonlinear elasticity theory, we investigate the monotonicity of isotropic tensor functions of the form \[ Σ_f\colon\mathrm{Sym}(n)\to\mathrm{Sym}(n)\,,\quad Σ_f(Q^T\mathrm{diag}(λ_1,\dotsc,λ_n)\, Q) = Q^T\mathrm{diag}(f(λ_1,\dotsc,λ_n))\, Q \quad\forall\;Q\in\mathrm{O}(n) \] with a vector function $f=(f_1,\dotsc,f_n)\colon\mathbb{R}^n\to\mathbb{R}^n$ which is symmetric, i.e.\ satisfies \[ f_i(λ_{π(1)},\dotsc,λ_{π(n)}) = f_{π(i)}(λ_1,\dotsc,λ_n) \] for any permutation $π\colon\{1,\dotsc,n\}\to\{1,\dotsc,n\}$, where $\mathrm{Sym}(n)$ denotes the space of symmetric $n\times n$ matrices, $\mathrm{O}n$ is the orthogonal group and $\mathrm{diag}(λ_1,\dotsc,λ_n)$ is the diagonal matrix with diagonal entries $λ_1,\dotsc,λ_n\in\mathbb{R}$. We prove that vector-monotonicity of $f$ on $\mathbb{R}^n$ is equivalent to matrix-monotonicity of the induced isotropic tensor function $Σ_f$ on $\mathrm{Sym}(n)$. Our results generalize the Chandler Davis theorem for convex scalar isotropic functions and are obtained independently of Hill's original proof of this equivalence. We also discuss simple invertibility conditions for isotropic matrix functions. We conclude by showing that injectivity of the Cauchy stress $V\mapstoσ(V)$, continuous differentiability, and positive definiteness of $\mathrm{sym}\,\mathrm Dσ(1\!\!\!\:1)$ in the natural state imply the strong Baker-Ericksen inequalities.