Reflection and transmission coefficients for three-dimensional plane waves in elastic media

Problems for transient line and point load sources in a multilayered elastic medium may be treated by the method of generalized ray. In this method an integral representation of the Laplace-transformed multiply reflected and/or transmitted cylindrical/spherical wave, known as a ray integral, is constructed by linear superposition of the Laplace-transformed plane waves. The inverse Laplace transform of the ray integral can be found in closed form by applying the Cagniard method. For problems in the Cartesian coordinates for line load sources emitting cylindrical waves consistent with either the plane strain conditions or the antiplane strain conditions and for problems in the cylindrical coordinates for axisymmetric and asymmetric point load sources emanating spherical waves, it is well known that: (1) the system of incident, reflected, and transmitted cylindrical/spherical waves at an interface separating two dissimilar media can be divided into two independent of each other, if both present, parts: the coupled P and SV waves, and the SH waves, (2) the reflected and transmitted ray integrals representing the Laplace-transformed reflected and transmitted cylindrical/spherical waves can be constructed by linear superposition of the Laplace-transformed plane P and SV waves, or the plane SH waves, and (3) the potential reflection and transmission coefficients for the plane P, SV, and S H waves are basic to such a superposition. In the present paper we treat the asymmetric three-dimensional problem in the Cartesian coordinates for an arbitrary oriented point force radiating the spherical P and S waves. For this problem all four functions representing the displacement potentials are coupled in the boundary conditions at the interface, the total wave motion at the interface is composed of the coupled spherical P and S waves, and the Laplace-transformed reflected and transmitted spherical waves are therefore constructed by linear superposition of the three-dimensional coupled plane P and S waves. Since such a superposition requires the knowledge of the potential reflection and transmission coefficients for the three-dimensional coupled plane P and S waves, the purpose of the present paper is to derive systematically these coefficient formulas.