Analysis of a penny-shaped crack in a magneto-electro-elastic medium

The solution for an ellipsoidal cavity in an infinite transversely isotropic magneto-electro-elastic medium under remotely applied axisymmetric, combined mechanical–electric–magnetic loading is derived. The exact solution for a penny-shaped crack is obtained by letting the minor axis of the ellipsoidal cavity approach zero. The results demonstrate that the stress intensity factor depends only on the applied mechanical loading, but the electric displacement intensity factor and the magnetic induction intensity factor depend on the applied combined loading, as well as the two ratios of β/α and γ/α. Parameter α is the ratio of the minor axis to the major axis of the ellipsoidal cavity, β is the ratio of the dielectric constant of the material in the cavity to the effective dielectric constant of the magneto-electro-elastic medium, and γ is the ratio of the magnetic permeability of the material in the cavity to the effective magnetic permeability of the magneto-electro-elastic medium. The two ratios characterize the permeability of the crack to electric and magnetic fields. Several limiting cases for β/α and γ/α are studied. A self-consistent method is adopted to determine the real crack opening α under the combined mechanical–electric–magnetic loading. The stress, electric displacement and magnetic induction intensity factors of a penny-shaped crack in BaTiO₃–CoFe₂O₄ composites are calculated for different volume fractions and different applied combined loadings.