Fracture simulations of particulate piezoelectric composites using the XFEM

Abstract

This paper investigates the influence of a piezoelectric (PE) particle pair on the crack-tip parameters. The I-integral is employed to solve the crack-tip stress intensity factors (SIFs) and electric displacement intensity factors (EDIFs) of a PE/dielectric material. The I-integral can decouple mixed-mode SIFs and EDIFs, and moreover, it is domain-independent for material interfaces, which greatly facilitate the extraction of the crack-tip field intensity factors for PE particulate composites by adopting an integral domain with arbitrary interfaces. Finally, a cracked dielectric plate reinforced by a pair of PE particles is studied to investigate the influences of the particle pair on the SIFs and EDIFs.