Interaction between annular crack and rigid disc inclusion in a transversely isotropic solid

An analytical approach has been presented to analyze the asymmetric and axisymmetric interactions between an annular crack and a rigid disc inclusion embedded in a transversely isotropic full-space. With the aid of a method of potential functions, Hankel and Abel transforms, the solution of the problems is reduced to a system of Fredholm integral equations, which are solved by using a numerical method. In each case, the stiffness of the disc inclusion and the stress intensity factor at the tips of the annular crack for different degrees of material anisotropy and different ratios of the inner and outer radius of the crack are illustrated graphically. Several limiting cases such as penny-shaped crack and external crack along with some exact solutions are presented to demonstrate the efficiency of the method.