Nonlinear electromechanical fields and localized polarization switching of piezoelectric macrofiber composites

This paper examines theoretically and experimentally the nonlinear electromechanical response of piezoelectric macrofiber composites.3D finite element analysis was carried out to study the strain versus electric field curve and the internal electromechanical fields near interdigitated electrodes in the macrofiber composites by introducing a model for polarization switching.The piezoelectric fibers in the macrofiber composite are partially or fully poled.Results on the strain versus electric field curves from microelectromechanical models and simple experiments were also presented, and comparison was made with the finite element solutions.The authors thank Smart Material Corp. for providing useful information regarding piezoelectric MFCs.