Enhanced piezoelectricity of P(VDF-TrFE) by BN nanosheets doping and leading to high performance laminated magnetoelectric composites

• Published in: Ceramics international 2024-12, Vol.50 (23), p.51972-51978
• Main Authors: Song, Hongrui, Liu, Huanbin, Qiu, Jing, Zhang, ShunYu, Li, Mingyu, Liu, Libo
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Magnetoelectric composite; P(VDF-TrFE); Piezoelectric film; Piezoelectricity
• ISSN: 0272-8842
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ceramint.2024.03.067

With the development trend of miniaturization, lightweight and portability of electronic equipment, piezoelectric devices have been widely applied to transducers, sensors and energy harvesters. Piezoelectric polymers, like poly(vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene) (P(VDF-TrFE)), possess the advantages of light weight, good flexibility, and simple preparation methods. However, P(VDF-TrFE) films is not entirely composed of piezoelectric phase (β phase), so increasing the content of β-phase is very important for the piezoelectric property of P(VDF-TrFE) films. Doping nanomaterials with unique properties has been proved to be a feasible way to increase the content of β-phase. In this paper, hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) nanosheets, a kind of 2-dimensional van der Waals materials with wide bandgap, as filler were doping into poly(vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene) (P(VDF-TrFE)) piezoelectric films by solution casting method. The composite films as designed, in which h-BN nanosheets were uniformly dispersed in P(VDF-TrFE), achieved higher contents of piezoelectric phase (β phase). Compared with pure P(VDF-TrFE) films, the optimal P(VDF-TrFE)/BN piezoelectric film achieved a much higher piezoelectric coefficient (d33) (∼42 pC/N), also leading to a higher piezoelectric voltage output than that of pure P(VDF-TrFE). By laminating the P(VDF-TrFE)/BN films as designed with FeSiB Metglas, high magnetoelectric voltage coefficients under zero and low DC magnetic bias were achieved. In summary, this paper presents a feasible and potential method for improving PVDF piezoelectricity, which has been successfully applied in high performance magnetoelectric devices.