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Chin. Phys. B, 2017, Vol. 26(4): 048801    DOI: 10.1088/1674-1056/26/4/048801
INTERDISCIPLINARY PHYSICS AND RELATED AREAS OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY Prev   Next  

Design and optimization of carbon nanotube/polymer actuator by using finite element analysis

Wei Zhang(张薇)1,2, Luzhuo Chen(陈鲁倬)1,2, Jianmin Zhang(张健敏)1,2, Zhigao Huang(黄志高)1,2
1 Fujian Provincial Key Laboratory of Quantum Manipulation and New Energy Materials, College of Physics and Energy, Fujian Normal University, Fuzhou 350117, China;
2 Fujian Provincial Collaborative Innovation Center for Optoelectronic Semiconductors and Efficient Devices, Xiamen 361005, China
Abstract  

In recent years, actuators based on carbon nanotube (CNT) or graphene demonstrate great potential applications in the fields of artificial muscles, smart switches, robotics, and so on. The electrothermal and photothermal bending actuators based on CNT/graphene and polymer composites show large bending actuations, which are superior to traditional thermal-driven actuators. However, the influence of material parameters (thickness, temperature change, etc.) on the actuation performance needs to be further studied, because it is a critical point to the design and fabrication of high-performance actuators. In this work, finite element analysis (FEA) is employed to simulate the actuation performance of CNT/polymer actuator, which has a bilayer structure. The main focus of this work is to design and to optimize material parameters by using computational method. FEA simulation results show that each layer thickness of actuator has an important influence on the actuation deformation. A maximum curvature of 2.7 cm-1 is obtained by simulation, which is much larger than most of the actuator curvature reported in previous experiments. What is more, larger temperature change and larger difference of coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) between two layers will result in larger bending actuation. This study is expected to provide valuable theoretical reference for the design and realization of CNT-based thermal actuator with ultra-large actuation performance.

Keywords:  actuator      carbon nanotubes      nanocomposites      finite element analysis  
Received:  21 October 2016      Revised:  17 January 2017      Accepted manuscript online: 
PACS:  88.30.rh (Carbon nanotubes)  
  02.70.Dh (Finite-element and Galerkin methods)  
  84.60.-h (Direct energy conversion and storage)  
  81.05.Qk (Reinforced polymers and polymer-based composites)  
Fund: 

Project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 11504051, 51202031, 61574037, and 11404058), the Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province, China (Grant Nos. 2017J06014, 2015J01008, and 2014J01175), Fujian Provincial Program for Distinguished Young Scientists in University (Grant No. J1-1166), and Fujian Provincial Key Project of Natural Science Foundation for Young Scientists in University (Grant No. JZ160428).

Corresponding Authors:  Luzhuo Chen     E-mail:  chenluzhuo@163.com

Cite this article: 

Wei Zhang(张薇), Luzhuo Chen(陈鲁倬), Jianmin Zhang(张健敏), Zhigao Huang(黄志高) Design and optimization of carbon nanotube/polymer actuator by using finite element analysis 2017 Chin. Phys. B 26 048801

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