New silicone dielectric elastomers with a high dielectric constant

Dielectric elastomers (Des) are a type of EAPs with unique electrical properties and mechanical properties: high actuation strains and stresses, fast response times, high efficiency, stability, reliability and durability. The excellent figures of merit possessed by dielectric elastomers make them the most performing materials which can be applied in many domains: biomimetics, aerospace, mechanics, medicals, etc. In this paper, we present a kind of electroactive polymer composites based on silicone Dielectric elastomers with a high dielectric constant. Novel high DEs could be realized by means of a composite approach. By filling an ordinary elastomer (e.g. silicone) with a component of functional ceramic filler having a greater dielectric permittivity, it is possible to obtain a resulting composite showing the fruitful combination of the matrix's advantageous elasticity and the filler's high permittivity. Here we add the ferroelectric relaxor ceramics (mainly BaTiO3) which has high dielectric constant (>3000) to the conventional silicone Dielectric elastomers, to get the dielectric elastomer which can exhibit high elastic energy densities induced by an electric field of about 15 MV/m. Tests of the physical and chemical properties of the dielectric elastomers are conducted, which verify our supposes and offer the experimental data supporting further researches.