Maxwell’s concept of
equivalent inhomogeneity is employed for evaluating the effective elastic
properties of macroscopically anisotropic particulate composites with isotropic
phases. The effective anisotropic elastic properties of the material are obtained
by comparing the far-field solutions for the problem of a finite cluster of
isotropic particles embedded in an infinite isotropic matrix with those for the
problem of a single anisotropic equivalent inhomogeneity embedded in the
same matrix. The former solutions precisely account for the interactions
between all particles in the cluster and for their geometrical arrangement.
Illustrative examples involving periodic (simple cubic) and random composites
suggest that the approach provides accurate estimates of their effective elastic
moduli.