| Affiliation: | (1) Department of Engineering Mechanics, Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084, China;(2) Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China |
| Abstract: | A nonlinear finite element (FE) model based on domain switching was proposed to study the electromechanical behavior of ferroelectric ceramics. The incremental FE formulation was improved to avoid any calculation instability. The problems of mesh sensitivity and convergence, and the efficiency of the proposed nonlinear FE technique have been assessed to illustrate the versatility and potential accuracy of the said technique. The nonlinear electromechanical behavior, such as the hysteresis loops and butterfly curves, of ferroelectric ceramics subjected to both a uniform electric field and a point electric potential has been studied numerically. The results obtained are in good agreement with those of the corresponding theoretical and experimental analyses. Furthermore, the electromechanical coupling fields near (a) the boundary of a circular hole, (b) the boundary of an elliptic hole and (c) the tip of a crack, have been analyzed using the proposed nonlinear finite element method (FEM). The proposed nonlinear electromechanically coupled FEM is useful for the analysis of domain switching, deformation and fracture of ferroelectric ceramics.The project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (10025209, 10132010 and 90208002), the Research Grants of the Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (HKU7086/02E) and the Key Grant Project of the Chinese Ministry of Education (0306) |
