The evolution of relatively undistorted progressing pulses in inhomogeneous elastic bodies is studied under the assumption that the wave is propagating into a homogeneous rest state and evolves from a disturbance which carries discontinuities of order two and higher in the space–time derivatives of the displacement field. An expression is obtained for the acceleration which is valid at the advancing wavefront, as well as on wavelets behind the lead characteristic; this expression reflects the influence of all initial discontinuities.
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