Effects of the material gradation on the SIFs of a crack in a 2-D FGM plate under thermal shock

Crack analysis of linear coupled thermoelasticity in two-dimensional, isotropic, non-homogeneous and linear elastic functionally graded materials subjected to thermal shock is performed by using a boundary-domain element method. The material parameters are assumed to be continuous functions of the spatial coordinates. Fundamental solutions of linear coupled thermoelasticity for the corresponding isotropic, homogeneous and linear elastic solids in Laplace-transformed domain are applied in the boundary-domain integral formulation. A collocation method is implemented for the numerical solution. Numerical examples for an exponential gradation of the material parameters are presented and discussed. The influences of the material gradation on the stress intensity factors are investigated. (© 2010 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)