Surface effects on the near-tip stresses for mode-I and mode-III cracks

Based on the surface elasticity theory and using a local asymptotic approach, we analyzed the influences of surface energy on the stress distributions near a blunt crack tip. The dependence relationship of the crack-tip stresses on surface elastic parameters is obtained for both mode-I and mode-III cracks. It is found that when the curvature radius of a crack front decreases to nanometers, surface energy significantly affects the stress intensities near the crack tip. Using a kind of surface elements, we also performed finite element simulations to examine the surface effects on the near-tip stresses. The obtained analytical solution agrees well with the numerical results.