Metal Ion Implanted Compliant Electrodes in Dielectric Electroactive Polymer (EAP) Membranes |
| Journal |
Advances in Science and Technology (Volume 61) |
| Volume |
Artificial Muscle Actuators using Electroactive Polymers |
| Edited by |
Pietro VINCENZINI, Yoseph BAR-COHEN and Federico CARPI |
| Pages |
18-25 |
| DOI |
10.4028/www.scientific.net/AST.61.18 |
| Online since |
September, 2008 |
| Authors |
Philippe Dubois,
Samuel Rosset,
Muhamed Niklaus,
Massoud Dadras,
Herbert Shea
|
| Keywords |
DEAP, Dielectric Electroactive Polymer Actuators, EAP, FCVA, Ion Implantation, PBII, PDMS (Polydimethylsiloxane) |
| Abstract |
One of the key factors to obtain large displacements and high efficiency with dielectric
electroactive polymer (DEAPs) actuators is to have compliant electrodes. Attempts to scale DEAPs
down to the mm or micrometer range have encountered major difficulties, mostly due to the
challenge of micropatterning sufficiently compliant electrodes. Simply evaporating or sputtering
thin metallic films on elastomer membranes produces DEAPs whose stiffness is dominated by the
metallic film.
Low energy metal ion implantation for fabricating compliant electrodes in DEAPs presents several
advantages: a) it is clean to work with, b) it does not add thick passive layers, and c) it can be easily
patterned. We use this technology to fabricate DEAPs micro-actuators whose relative displacement
is the same as for macro-scale DEAPs. With transmission electron microscope (TEM) we observed
the formation of metallic clusters within the elastomer (PDMS) matrix, forming a nano-composite.
We focus our studies on relating the properties of this nano-composite to the implantation
parameters. We identified the optimal implantation parameters for which an implanted electrode
presents an exceptional combination of high electrical conductivity and low compliance. |
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