Analysis of the derivative of the energy functional with respect to the length of a curvilinear crack in an elastic body with a possible crack-edge contact

A homogeneous two-dimensional body with a crack of variable length is considered. At the crack edges, conditions are formulated in the form of inequalities that describe mutual nonpenetration of the edges. The derivative of the elastic-energy functional with respect to the length of the curvilinear crack is analyzed. It is shown that the derivative is independent of the crack path, provided that the curve along which the crack propagates is reasonably smooth. __________ Translated from Prikladnaya Mekhanika i Tekhnicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 48, No. 5, pp. 138–145, September–October, 2007.     

Generalized Newton methods for crack problems with nonpenetration condition

A class of semismooth Newton methods for unilaterally constrained variational problems modeling cracks under a nonpenetration condition is introduced and investigated. On the continuous level, a penalization technique is applied that allows to argue generalized differentiability of the nonlinear mapping associated to its first‐order optimality characterization. It is shown that the corresponding semismooth Newton method converges locally superlinearly. For the discrete version of the problem, fast local as well as global and monotonous convergence of a discrete semismooth Newton method are proved. A comprehensive report on numerical tests for the two‐dimensional Lamé problem with three collinear cracks under the nonpenetration condition ends the article. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Numer Methods Partial Differential Eq, 2005     

Optimization formulation of the evolutionary problem of crack propagation under quasibrittle fracture

For the evolutionary problem describing crack propagation in a solid with allowance for the irreversible work of plastic deformation due to the crack propagation, a general optimization formulation is proposed and investigated. For the optimum crack, data on the H²-smoothnesses of the displacement field in the solid and, hence, on the finiteness of the stress at the crack tip, are obtained. The solvability of the optimization problem (i.e., the existence of an optimum crack) is proved for a curvilinear crack propagation path specified a priori. For the particular case of a straight path, a generalized criterion of crack growth is proposed. The question of the choice of a crack propagation path is discussed and a comparison with existing fracture criteria is made. __________ Translated from Prikladnaya Mekhanika i Tekhnicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 47, No. 5, pp. 107–118, September–October, 2006.