Buckling failures in curved shell structures: a comprehensive review of theory, design, and applications

Abstract This review provides a comprehensive look at buckling failures in curved shell structures, unifying theoretical advancements, design guidelines, and practical applications to bridge gaps in existing literature. It critically analyses how geometric, material, and load-boundary imperfections influence buckling behaviour, providing insights into discrepancies between theoretical and experimental results. The paper’s key novelty lies in this comprehensive and unified approach, which uniquely evaluates modern design codes such as NASA SP-8007, ECCS, and PD 5500, highlighting their limitations for composite materials. The review also addresses the increasing use of lightweight composites like carbon fibre-reinforced plastic (CFRP) and examines real-world failure cases to highlight key design and manufacturing challenges. It provides a critical analysis of advanced numerical and experimental techniques like geometrically and materially nonlinear analysis with imperfections (GMNIA) and digital image correlation (DIC), while also proposing future research directions. The interdisciplinary approach is relevant to aerospace, civil, and marine engineering, aiming to promote knowledge transfer and contribute to the development of safer and more efficient structural designs.