STRONGLY NONLINEAR COMPOSITES - A 2ND-ORDER THEORY FOR ESTIMATING TRANSPORT-PROPERTIES

A new theory is proposed for estimating the effective behavior of nonl inear composites. The theory involves the restatement of the effective energy function of a nonlinear composite in terms of the energy funct ion of an appropriately chosen linear composite with anisotropic phase s. This allows the direct conversion of well-known estimates for linea r composites into corresponding estimates for nonlinear ones. The resu lting estimates are exact to second-order in the contrast and satisfy all known bounds.