In this paper, we give a targeted review of the state of the art in the study of planar elastic beams in large deformations, also in the presence of geometric nonlinearities. The main scope of this work is to present the different methods of analysis available for describing the possible equilibrium forms and the motions of elastic beams. For the sake of completeness, we start by giving an overview of the nonlinear theories introduced for approaching this argument and then we account for the variational principles and deformation energies introduced for modelling beams undergoing large deformations and displacements. We then consider different kinds of loads treated in the literature and the corresponding induced beam deformations. We conclude by accounting for the available analysis for stability and some considerations about problems where live loads are applied, as well as by describing some relevant numerical methods of use in the applications we have in mind. The selection criterion for the reviewed papers is dictated by the need to study large deformations and the dynamics of pantographic sheets. (Large deformations of planar extensible beams and pantographic lattices: heuristic homogenization, experimental and numerical examples of equilibrium. Proc R Soc A 2016; 472(2185): 20150790), dell’Isola et al. (Designing a light fabric metamaterial being highly macroscopically tough under directional extension: first experimental evidence. Z Angew Math Phys 2015; 66(6): 3473–3498), Turco et al. (Hencky-type discrete model for pantographic structures: numerical comparison with second gradient continuum models. Z Angew Math Phys 2016; 67(4): 1–28)].
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