On discontinuous strain fields in finite elastostatics

A general method for the study of piece-wise homogeneous strain fields in finite elasticity is proposed. Critical homogeneous deformations, supporting strain jumping, are defined for any anisotropic elastic material under constant Piola– Kirchhoff stress field in three-dimensional elasticity. Since Maxwell s sets appear in the neighborhood of singularities higher than the fold, the existence of a cusp singularity is a sufficient condition for the emergence of piece-wise constant strain fields. General formulae are derived for the study of any problem without restrictions or fictitious stress–strain laws. The theory is implemented in a simple shearing plane strain problem. Nevertheless, the procedure is valid for any anisotropic material and three-dimensional problems.