AN EFFECTIVE MEDIUM APPROACH TO THE STUDY OF PLANE-WAVE PROPAGATION IN AN ELASTIC MATRIX WITH SPHERICAL ELASTIC INCLUSIONS

A method was developed by Gaunaurd, (Uberall and others to describe the behaviour of elastic composites under excitation by a plane longitudinal incident wave. Frequency dependent estimates were obtained for the effective bulk modulus whereas the effective shear modulus and density were estimated by constants. Here, frequency dependent estimates are obtained for all three effective elastic parameters and it is shown that the predictions for longitudinal speed and attenuation are very much improved in comparison with an alternative model and with experimental data. Dynamic estimates are also obtained for the effective speed and attenuation of shear waves and results for both longitudinal and transverse incidence are incorporated into the theory.