solids4foam: A toolbox for performing solid mechanics and fluid-solid interaction simulations in OpenFOAM

This article presents solids4foam, a finite-volume toolbox for solid mechanics and fluid–solid interaction simulations within OpenFOAM. It describes the toolbox’s core capabilities—including material models, coupling strategies, boundary conditions, discretisation approaches, and solution algorithms—and situates it within the wider landscape of OpenFOAM-based and external solid mechanics and FSI frameworks. The work provides a detailed account of solids4foam’s design, scope, and distinguishing features relative to other available toolboxes, highlighting its role as a general-purpose, actively maintained environment for multiphysics simulation.