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 degC. The high room temperature relative dielectric constant (~50), which is the highest among all the known polymers), high induced polarization (~0.05 C/m²), and high electric breakdown field (>400 MV/m) lead to very high volume efficiency for the electric energy storage operated under high voltage (~10 J/cm³)