Influence of Initial Discontinuities on Relatively Undistorted Progressive Pulses in Inhomogeneous Elastic

Abstract: The evolution of relatively undistorted progressing pulses in inhomogeneous elastic bodies is stud-ied under the assumption that the wave is propagating into a homogeneous rest state and evolves from a disturbance which carries discontinuities of order two and higher in the space–time derivatives of the dis-placement field. An expression is obtained for the acceleration which is valid at the advancing wavefront, as well as on wavelets behind the lead characteristic this expression reflects the influence of all initial discon-tinuities. Key Words: relatively undistorted pulses, elastic material, acceleration wave 1