Effect of constrained fibers on electromechanical actuation of charge-controlled dielectric elastomers. (26th February 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Zhang, Junshi; Chen, Hualing; Li, Dichen
• Is Part Of: Europhysics letters. Volume 120:Number 6(2017:Dec.)
• Publication Date: 2018-02-26
• Subjects: 77.55.-g -- 77.84.Jd; Physics -- Periodicals; Electronic journals; 530.05
• DOI: 10.1209/0295-5075/120/67001
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0295-5075

Abstract

Abstract: As is known, electromechanical deformation of voltage-controlled dielectric elastomers (DEs) is significant but is susceptible to pull-in and snap-through instabilities, while the large stable deformation can be achieved by spraying charge on DE surfaces, i.e., charge-controlled DEs. In this article, we investigate the effect of constrained fibers on electromechanical actuation of charge-controlled DEs by involving two special deformation modes: uniaxial tension and pure shear state. The coupled effects between the geometrical sizes and the mechanical tensile force of the charge-controlled DEs are also explored. The research results indicate that, different from voltage-controlled DEs, the electromechanical stretch of charge-controlled DEs with constrained fibers does not always show a beneficial merit with respect to that of the charge-controlled DEs without constrained fibers.