THEORETICAL AND APPLIED MECHANICS

   TEORIJSKA I PRIMENJENA MEHANIKA  2003 Vol.30 (1), pp.41-53

Summary: 

Carmine Trimarco

The Green's and the Eshelby's identities in generalised continua
and in dielectrics

In 1973, A. E. Green pointed out several interesting formulae, which hold true in finite elasticity. One of them is repeatedly quoted in the literature as the Green identity. This remarkable identity has been successfully employed in several contexts. We only mention here its central role in theorems on uniqueness in elastostatics. A deeper insight to the Green identity shows in evidence an intimate link of this formula with the Eshelby tensor and with the material balance law of equilibrium. In homogeneous hyperelastic materials, this law turns out to an identity, the Eshelby identity, and one can easily prove that the Green identity stems straightforwardly from the Eshelby identity. These identities possibly extend to generalized continua, such as continua with microstructure and elastic dielectrics. Hereafter, the validity of the Eshelby identity is discussed for these materials. Basing on the novel extended Eshelby-like identity, the corresponding extended Green-like identity can be also established, under specific assumptions. In the case of dielectrics, two equivalent forms for the Eshelby tensor emerge from the treatment, both satisfying the Eshelby identity. One of them is more appropriate for deriving the desired Green-like identity. The second one, which is a reduced form of the first one, represents the physical Eshelby tensor in dielectrics.