There is, I think, something ethereal about i —the square root of minus one. I remember first hearing about it at school. It seemed an odd beast at that time—an intruder hovering on the edge of reality.

Usually familiarity dulls this sense of the bizarre, but in the case of i it was the reverse: over the years the sense of its surreal nature intensified. It seemed that it was impossible to write mathematics that described the real world in …

I and i

The American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) is an independent organization devoted to the development of standards.

American Society for Testing and Materials

Dielectric polymer nanocomposites are rapidly emerging as novel materials for a number of advanced engineering applications. In this Review, we present a comprehensive review of the use of ferroelectric polymers, especially PVDF and PVDF-based copolymers/blends as potential components in dielectric nanocomposite materials for high energy density capacitor applications. Various parameters like dielectric constant, dielectric loss, breakdown strength, energy density, and flexibility of the polymer nanocomposites have been thoroughly investigated. Fillers with different shapes have been found to cause significant variation in the physical and electrical properties. Generally, one-dimensional and two-dimensional nanofillers with large aspect ratios provide enhanced flexibility versus zero-dimensional fillers. Surface modification of nanomaterials as well as polymers adds flavor to the dielectric properties of the resulting nanocomposites. Nowadays, three-phase nanocomposites with either combination of fillers...

Recent Progress on Ferroelectric Polymer-Based Nanocomposites for High Energy Density Capacitors: Synthesis, Dielectric Properties, and Future Aspects.

Study of flexible nanodielectric materials (FNDMs) with high permittivity is one of the most active academic research areas in advanced functional materials. FNDMs with excellent dielectric properties are demonstrated to show great promise as energy-storage dielectric layers in high-performance capacitors. These materials, in common, consist of nanoscale particles dispersed into a flexible polymer matrix so that both the physical/chemical characteristics of the nanoparticles and the interaction between the nanoparticles and the polymers have crucial effects on the microstructures and final properties. This review first outlines the crucial issues in the nanodielectric field and then focuses on recent remarkable research developments in the fabrication of FNDMs with special constitutents, molecular structures, and microstructures. Possible reasons for several persistent issues are analyzed and the general strategies to realize FNDMs with excellent integral properties are summarized. The review further highlights some exciting examples of these FNDMs for power-energy-storage applications.

Flexible Nanodielectric Materials with High Permittivity for Power Energy Storage

During the last two decades atmospheric (or high) pressure non-thermal plasmas in and in contact with liquids have received a lot of attention in view of their considerable environmental and medical applications. The simultaneous generation of intense UV radiation, shock waves and active radicals makes these discharges particularly suitable for decontamination, sterilization and purification purposes. This paper reviews the current status of research on atmospheric pressure non-thermal discharges in and in contact with liquids. The emphasis is on their generation mechanisms and their physical characteristics.

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0022-3727/42/5/053001/pdf

Non-thermal plasmas in and in contact with liquids

Our purpose is to present a critical review of the current understanding of streamer propagation in dielectric liquids in order to help define the direction of future research. We show that the molecular structure has a significant effect on streamer propagation. The main parameter affecting propagation is the electronic affinity of the liquid molecules.

/pdf/propagation-and-structure-of-streamers-in-liquid-dielectrics-2ve8fitxju.pdf

Propagation and structure of streamers in liquid dielectrics

In this short review, we discussed some aspects of nanocomposites regarding electrical tree growth and breakdown. It appears that nanoparticles, properly mixed and dispersed in the polymer matrix, increase the breakdown strength and hinder the growth of electrical trees in the nanocomposite. Nanoparticles act as barriers obstructing electrical tree growth and delaying dielectric breakdown. This article also put forward a tentative proposal for the mechanisms of treeing and breakdown in nanocomposites.

Nanocomposites-a review of electrical treeing and breakdown

Different properties and phenomena that polymer nanocomposites exhibit compared to the base polymers or conventional polymers (polymers with micron scale particles) are attributed to interfaces features. As a consequence, theories and models (such as Lewis' model, Tsagaropoulos' model and the multicore model proposed by Tanaka) have been proposed, primarily to interpret the physical, chemical and electrical structure of interfaces. Moreover, these models try to explain several different phenomena and properties that polymer nanocomposites exhibit based on the interfaces features. According to these models, the interface with thickness comparable to the diameter of the nanoparticle consists of multilayers. In this paper, a detailed review and analysis of these models and theories is presented. Differences and similarities of the models are also discussed.

Interfaces features in polymer nanocomposites: a review of proposed models

In this study, three different insulating liquids, natural ester, mineral oil which is currently used by the Public Power Corporation of Greece and a nanofluid of surface coated Fe3O4 nanoparticles into a natural ester matrix, were subjected to AC voltage stress and their statistical breakdown voltage was measured and compared. Three different electrode configurations were used during the measurements in order to study the effect of non-uniform fields on the breakdown voltage distribution. Four different statistical distributions were used for the statistical processing of the experimental results. The two of them were the frequently used normal and Weibull distributions; in addition, Gumbel and generalised extreme value (GEV) function distributions were studied. It was shown that, in most cases, the experimental data followed GEV and Weibull functions rather than normal or Gumbel. Therefore, GEV statistics fits indiscriminately better to the experimental results concerning breakdown voltage, for the three different electrodes configuration and the three understudied insulating oils. The experimental results indicated that nanofluid has better performance, in terms of dielectric breakdown voltage, compared with natural ester oil and mineral oil, hence nanofluid is considered as a potential substitute of the conventional dielectric liquids, with enhanced properties and prospects.

https://ietresearch.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1049/iet-smt.2016.0031

Statistical investigation of AC breakdown voltage of nanofluids compared with mineral and natural ester oil

Some of the factors affecting the dielectric strength of transformer oil are investigated. These factors include the stabilization phenomenon, oil and electrode pretreatment, the effect of oil velocity, the effect of a capacitance parallel to the test cell, and the effects of electrode area and gap spacing. The experimental apparatus and procedure are described, and the results are presented for each of the above factors. Suggestions for future research are offered. >

Michael G. Danikas

Papers

Propagation and structure of streamers in liquid dielectrics

Nanocomposites-a review of electrical treeing and breakdown

Interfaces features in polymer nanocomposites: a review of proposed models

Statistical investigation of AC breakdown voltage of nanofluids compared with mineral and natural ester oil

Breakdown of transformer oil