On the propagation of elasto-thermodiffusive surface waves in heat-conducting materials

The present paper deals with the study of the propagation of Rayleigh surface waves in homogeneous isotropic, thermodiffusive elastic half-space. After developing the formal solution of the model, the secular equations for stress free, thermally insulated or isothermal, and isoconcentrated boundary conditions of the half-space have been obtained. The secular equations have been solved by using irreducible Cardano's method with the help of DeMoivre's theorem in order to obtain phase velocity and attenuation coefficient of waves under consideration. The motion of the surface particles during the Rayleigh surface wave propagation is also discussed and found to be elliptical in general. The inclinations of wave normal with the major axis of the elliptical path of a typical particle have also been computed. Finally, the numerically simulated results regarding phase velocity, attenuation coefficient, specific loss and thermo-mechanical coupling factors of thermoelastic diffusive waves have been obtained and presented graphically. Some very interesting and useful characteristics of surface acoustic waves have been obtained, which may help in improving the fabrication quality of optical and electronic devices in addition to construction and design of materials such as semiconductors and composite structures. Therefore, this work finds applications in the geophysics and electronics industry.