A unified numerical approach for thermal analysis of transversely isotropic fiber-reinforced composites containing inhomogeneous interphase

This paper presents a general method to tackle thermal analysis of transversely isotropic fiber-reinforced composites comprising an inhomogeneous interphase with arbitrary variations of material properties. Based on the assumption of generalized plane strain, the governing equation describing the deformations and stresses of the composites subjected to a thermal loading is derived from the theory of elasticity and solved efficiently. With the proposed method, the effects of different variations of material properties and different volume fractions of the interphase on the stresses in the composites are investigated. They strongly influence the circumferential and axial stresses in the interphase, but make slight differences to these stresses in the fiber and matrix.