Development of poly(p-phenylene)/crosslinked poly(3-caprolactone) as electroactive shape memory composite

Abstract

Electroactive shape memory composites are smart materials that change their shapes and recover their initial shapes in the presence of an applied electric field. In this work, the focus is on fabricating an electroactive shape memory composite consisting of iron (Ill) chloride doped poly(p-phenylene)(PPP)/crosslinked poly(ε-caprolactone) (cPCL) using benzoyl peroxide (BPO) as a crosslinking agent. In addition, thermal property, electrical conductivity, and electromechanical properties of the composite as a function of crosslinking ratio. doping level, and concentration of embedded PPP are investigated. The electromechanical properties show that 3%wt BPO cPCL gives the highest storage modulus response and electrical sensitivity. However, the electrical sensitivity decreases dramatically at 0.01%v/v of embedded PPP because of the increasing of initial storage modulus. Then start to increase with increasing the concentration of PPP which can be attributed to the increases of dipole moment induction in the presence of an external electrical stimulation.