STATISTICAL-THEORY OF THE TENSILE-STRENGTH OF SOLIDS WITH STRUCTURAL DEFECTS

A more rigorous treatment of the probability of the local defect densi ty leads to a logarithmic dependence of the ''size effect.'' The proba bility of a discontinuity at a given stress is determined along with t he tensile strength, which depends on the average defect density rho. The bounds of validity of the theory developed in the article are esti mated. The results for the differential (with respect to rho) tensile strength are consistent with an earlier study of the feasibility of de termining relative strength by nonlinear acoustics methods [5, 6].