A strain gradient enhanced model for the phase‐field approach to fracture

Phase-field modelling has been shown to be a powerful tool for simulating fracture processes and predicting the crack path under complex loading conditions. Note that the total energy of fracture in the classical phase-field formulations includes the strain energy density from the linear elasticity theory resulting in singular stresses at the crack tip. Recently, we have demonstrated that integrating the strain gradient elasticity into the conventional phase-field fracture formulations may improve the final results by alleviating the effects of a singular stress field around the crack tip [1]. The current contribution focuses on a more general formulation of strain gradient elasticity