Dear Jason, Thank you.

Dear Jason,

Thank you. You helped a lot. What you said is exactly what I was doubting. So UEL is a more general concept than UMAT and can include the constitutive equations of the material behavior as well. I just need to embed the constitutive equations in the UEL along with the element description.

In my UEL, as you mentioned, I am going to implement XFEM formulation and use it together with a damage model, i.e. XFEM is to be linked to plasticity. Do you know perhaps if there is any reference, apart from what is in Abaqus manual, which clearly describes how to write a UEL in Abaqus?

Best regards,

Hadi