A new kind of electro-active polymer composite composed of silicone elastomer and polyethylene glycol

In this work, a new kind of electro-active polymer composite composed of silicone and polyethylene glycol (PEG) was prepared by solution blending. Two types of PEG with average molecular weights of 600(PEG600) and 1500(PEG1500) were first blended with liquid silicone (DC3481) separately. Then, the dielectric, electrical, mechanical and electromechanical properties of pure silicone and the silicone/PEG composites were investigated. The silicone/PEG600 composite shows an increased dielectric constant and a decreased Young's modulus, resulting in an improved figure of merit (FOM) and an actuation strain of 11.5% at 40 V mu m(-1), which is 64% higher than pure silicone. This indicates that the actuation properties of silicone are largely improved by the addition of PEG600. However, for the silicone/PEG1500 composite, a much higher dielectric constant and an increased modulus due to its semi-crystalline structure are obtained, which lead to a decreased FOM and a smaller actuation strain than that of pure silicone. In addition, a comparison between theoretical strain and the corresponding experiment value was made. And the results indicate that not only the FOM, but the dielectric loss and mechanical loss play an important role in the actuation properties.