Recent advances in highly electrostrictive P(VDF-TrFE-CFE) terpolymers

Ferroelectric materials are intrinsically multifunctional and have found a broad range of applications. A new class of semicrystalline terpolymers comprising vinylidene fluoride (VDF), trifluoroethylene (TrFE), and 1, 1-chlorofluoroethylene (CFE), were prepared at Institut de Saint-Louis (ISL) via a suspension polymerization process. Relevant studies and results show that this class of electroactive polymers offers unique properties in comparison with other ferroelectric polymers. The terpolymer exhibits high electrostrictive strain (> 7%) with relatively high modulus (> 0.3GPa). It has been also observed that the large electrostrictive strain is nearly constant in the temperature range from 20 to 80 degrees C. The high room temperature relative dielectric constant (similar to 50), which is the highest among all the known polymers), high induced polarization (similar to 0.05 C/m(2)), and high electric breakdown field (> 400 MV/m) lead to very high volume efficiency for the electric energy storage operated under high voltage (similar to 10 J/cm(3)).