Dynamic interaction of multiple arbitrarily oriented planar cracks in a piezoelectric space : a semi-analytic solution.

Abstract

The problem of determining the electro-elastic fields around arbitrarily oriented planar cracks in an infinite piezoelectric space is considered. The cracks which are acted upon by a transient load are either electrically impermeable or permeable. A semi-analytic method based on the theory of exponential Fourier transformation is proposed for solving the problem in the Laplace transform domain. The Laplace transforms of the jumps in the displacements and electric potential across opposite crack faces are determined by solving a system of hypersingular integral equations. Once these displacement and electric potential jumps are obtained, the displacements and electric potential and other physical quantities of interest, such as the crack tip stress and electric displacement intensity factors, can be computed with the help of a suitable algorithm for inverting Laplace transforms. The stress and electric displacement intensity factors are computed for some specific cases of the problem.