Materials like alloys, which enable the functionality of technical products, change the microstructure over time. For instance, phase separation, coarsening and damage processes take place.

Well established models describing phase separation and coarsening phenomena are the Cahn-Hilliard system and its extended system with elasticity.

We develop further the existing framework of Cahn-Hilliard systems by coupling these systems with a unidirectional evolution inclusion for an internal variable, describing damage processes. For the coupled systems, we provide a suitable notion of weak solutions and show existence results.

This is a joint work with C. Heinemann (WIAS, Berlin).