Electromechanical homogenization of PolyVinyliDene Fluoride PVDF polymer reinforced by Graphene nanoribbons

Our work consists in modelling the effective properties of a piezoelectric-based nanocomposite that will be used for aeronautical applications. For this purpose, the PolyVinyliDene Fluoride (PVDF) is considered as a polymer piezoelectric matrix in which Graphene nanoRibbons (GnR) are spatially oriented as inclusions. Two different methods were used to estimate the effective properties: the Mori-Tanaka (MT) micromechanics scheme and the finite Element (FE) analysis. In the MT homogenization scheme, the electro-elastic Eshelby tensor was first computed for an anisotropic matrix. The entire MT scheme was implemented in the MATLAB environment. Afterwards a FE model of a nanocomposite unit cell was developed with ABAQUS in order to estimate the effective properties. The effective properties computed with the MT scheme showed good agreement with the predictions of the FE model. The orientation of GnR inclusions as well as their volume fraction in the PVDF matrix were found to significantly affect the effective electro-elastic properties of the GnR/PVDF nanocomposite. In addition, several physical mechanisms such as stacking-up and alignment defects of GnR were analyzed for their negative influence on the reinforcement effect of GnR. Our theoretical study will help in understanding the favorable effects of nano-inclusions over piezoelectric nanocomposites.