This paper presents a finite element framework for imposing frictional contact conditions on embedded fracture faces, implemented by the constant-strain assumed enhanced strain (AES) method, where penalty method is used to impose both non-penetration constraint and Coulomb's law of friction. The proposed constant-strain AES method for modeling embedded frictional contact can be cast into an integration algorithm similar to those used in the classical plasticity theory, where displacement jump is calculated from the local traction equilibrium at Gauss point, so the method does not introduce any additional global degrees of freedom. Moreover, constant-strain elements are often desirable in practice because they can be easily created automatically for large-scale engineering applications with complicated geometries. As encountered in other enriched finite element methods for frictional contact, the problem of normal contact pressure oscillations is also observed in the constant-strain AES method. Therefore, we developed a strain-smoothing procedure to effectively mitigate the oscillations. We investigated and verified the proposed AES framework through several numerical examples, and illustrated the capability of this method in solving challenging nonlinear frictional contact problems.

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Keywords: Assumed enhanced strain (AES) method Frictional contact, Strain-smoothing method, Penalty method