Exact Solutions for the Analysis of Piezoelectric Fiber Reinforced Composites as Distributed Actuators for Smart Composite Plates

Performance of a layer of piezoelectric fiber reinforced composite (PFRC) material as the distributed actuator for smart composite plates has been investigated in this paper. The investigation is performed by finding the exact solutions for static analysis of simply supported symmetric and anti-symmetric cross-ply laminated plates integrated with a layer of PFRC material. The results suggest the potential use of PFRC materials for the distributed actuators of smart structures with both thick and thin substrate composite plates.