Synergistic Improvement of Actuation Properties with Compatibilized High Permittivity Filler

Abstract

Electroactive polymers can be used for actuators with many desirable features, including high electromechanical energy density, low weight, compactness, direct voltage control, and complete silence during actuation. These features may enable personalized robotics with much higher ability to delicately manipulate their surroundings than can be achieved with currently available actuators; however, much work is still necessary to enhance the electroactive materials. Electric field‐driven actuator materials are improved by an increase in permittivity and by a reduction in stiffness. Here, a synergistic enhancement method based on a macromolecular plasticizing filler molecule with a combination of both high dipole moment and compatibilizer moieties, synthesized to simultaneously ensure improvement of electromechanical properties and compatibility with the host matrix is presented. Measurements show an 85% increase in permittivity combined with 290% reduction in mechanical stiffness. NMR measurements confirm the structure of the filler while DSC measurements confirm that it is compatible with the host matrix at all the mixture ratios investigated. Actuation strain measurements in the pure shear configuration display an increase in sensitivity to the electrical field of more than 450%, confirming that the filler molecule does not only improve dielectric and mechanical properties, it also leads to a synergistic enhancement of actuation properties by simple means.

Chemical modification of polysiloxanes with polar pendant groups by co-hydrosilylation

“…The increase in 3 0 at lower frequencies was reported before, for example, in silicone lms blended with cyanopropyl-modi-ed polysiloxanes 31 and was assigned to adsorbed water. Indeed, by increasing the polarity of a polymer, the amount of absorbed water from atmosphere should increase.…”

Polar–nonpolar interconnected elastic networks with increased permittivity and high breakdown fields for dielectric elastomer transducers

“…A plasticizing effect of P x on the PDMS matrix was observed for all the interconnected networks. Such effect was reported before for blends and was assigned to the additional volume of the dispersed phase, 31,45 when the phases were mixed in solution.…”

Tailoring Dielectric and Actuated Properties of Elastomer Composites by Bioinspired Poly(dopamine) Encapsulated Graphene Oxide

“…For instance, the actuated strain at 4 kV/mm increases from 1.20% for pure XNBR to 3.8% for GO-PDA-0.5/XNBR composite. Moreover, the actuated strain at 2 kV/mm of pure XNBR increases from 0.23 to 2.3% with the addition of 0.5 vol % of GO-PDA-0.25, much higher than that of other previously reported DEs, ,,− as summarized in Table . The improvement in actuated strain at low electric fields is in favor of the application of DE in biological and medical fields (such as artificial skin), tactile displays, and braille displays, etc …”