Theoretical model and phase-field method were developed to investigate the oxygen diffusion behaviour at a crack tip. The results showed that, because of the r-½ stress singularity, the oxygen concentration at the crack tip had a much higher singularity: exp[r-½]. Therefore, even if the environmental oxygen concentration was low, oxygen concentration at the crack tip would be sufficiently high to cause local oxidation and degradation in actual applications.

Interplay Between Fracture and Diffusion Behaviors: Modeling and Phase Field Computation. F.Yang, B.Liu, D.Fang: Computational Materials Science, 2011, 50[9], 2554-60