The J-area integral applied in peridynamics

The J -integral is in its original formulation expressed as a contour integral. The contour formulation was, however, found cumbersome early on to apply in the finite element analysis, for which method the more directly applicable J -area integral formulation was later developed. In a previous study, we expressed the J -contour integral as a function of displacements only, to make the integral directly applicable in peridynamics (Stenström and Eriksson in Int J Fract 216:173–183, 2019). In this article we extend the work to include the J -area integral by deriving it as a function of displacements only, to obtain the alternative method of calculating the J -integral in peridynamics as well. The properties of the area formulation are then compared with those of the contour formulation, using an exact analytical solution for an infinite plate with a central crack in Mode I loading. The results show that the J -area integral is less sensitive to local disturbances compared to the contour counterpart. However, peridynamic implementation is straightforward and of similar scope for both formulations. In addition, discretization, effects of boundaries, both crack surfaces and other boundaries, and integration contour corners in peridynamics are considered.