Connectivity and Conductivity of a Three-Dimensional Checkerboard-Shaped Composite Material

We consider the problem of whether the three-dimensional checkerboard has the connectivity. For this purpose, we first consider the problem of determining the effective conductivity of a checkerboard-shaped composite material by the Brownian motion simulation method. Specifically, we use the efficient first-passage-time technique. Simulation results show that the effective conductivity of the three-dimensional checkerboard increases faster than the two-dimensional counterpart as the contrast between the phase conductivities increases. This implies that the three-dimensional checkerboard's connectivity is stronger than the two-dimensional checkerboard's and thus each phase material of the three-dimensional checkerboard is more likely to be connected than not to be connected.