Abstract
We study the macroscopic elastic moduli of an elastic percolating network in the critical region. A microscopic elastic Hamiltonian is used, which contains a bending energy term. We find that the rigidity threshold of this system is identical to the percolation threshold . By considering the elastic properties of elements of the infinite percolation cluster we calculate the critical exponent which describes the behavior of the elastic stiffness near for and obtain a lower bound on for . is considerably higher than the conductivity exponent , suggesting that the elastic problem belongs to a different universality class.
- Received 27 January 1984
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.52.1891
©1984 American Physical Society