The completeness and a new derivation of the Stroh formalism of anisotropic linear elasticity

In this paper we present a new, simpler and unified derivation of the Stroh formalism of anisotropic linear elasticity, for both nondegenerate and degenerate cases. It is based on the potential representation and Jordan canonical representation theorems. The completeness of the Stroh formalism is proved in the derivation process itself. This new approach is also extended to piezoelastic problems. Besides, we show that the eigenvalues of the fundamental elastic matrix in planar anisotropic elasticity are always distinct, except for the case of isotropy. The project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (19525207 and 19891180).