Magneto-Mechanical Enhancement of Elastic Moduli in Magnetoactive Elastomers with Anisotropic Microstructures

Magnetoactive elastomers (MAEs) have gained significant attention in recent years due to their wide range of engineering applications. This paper investigates the important interplay between the particle microstructure and the sample shape of MAEs. A simple analytical expression is derived based on geometrical arguments to describe the particle distribution inside MAEs. In particular, smeared microstructures are considered instead of a discrete particle distribution. As a consequence of considering structured particle arrangements, the elastic free energy is anisotropic. It is formulated with the help of the rule of mixtures. We show that the enhancement of elastic moduli arises not only from the induced dipole-dipole interactions in the presence of an external magnetic field but also considerably from the change in the particle microstructure.

Automated summary

Magnetoactive elastomers (MAEs) have attracted significant attention due to their wide engineering applications. This paper investigates the interplay between particle microstructure and sample shape in MAEs. By considering smeared microstructures, the study derives a simple analytical expression to describe the particle distribution, revealing that the enhancement of elastic moduli in MAEs comes from both induced dipole-dipole interactions and changes in particle microstructure.