Weak solvability of a piezoelectric contact problem

Abstract

We consider a mathematical model which describes the frictional contact between a piezoelectric body and a foundation. The material behaviour is modelled with a non-linear electro-elastic constitutive law, the contact is bilateral, the process is static and the foundation is assumed to be electrically conductive. Both the friction law and the electrical conductivity condition on the contact surface are described with subdifferential boundary conditions. We derive a variational formulation of the problem which is of the form of a system of two coupled hemi-variational inequalities for the displacement and the electric potential fields, respectively. Then we prove the existence of a weak solution to the model and, under additional assumptions, its uniqueness. The proof is based on an abstract result on operator inclusions in Banach spaces.