Flexoelectricity

Flexoelectricity is a property of a dielectric material whereby it exhibits a spontaneous electrical polarization induced by a strain gradient. Flexoelectricity is not the same as Ferroelasticity.

The electric polarization due to mechanical stress in a dielectric is given by

$P_{i}=d_{ijk}\sigma _{jk}+\mu _{ijkl}{\frac {\partial \epsilon _{jk}}{\partial x_{l}}}$

where the first term corresponds to the direct piezoelectric effect and the second term corresponds to the flexoelectric polarization induced by the strain gradient.

Here, the flexoelectric coefficient, $\mu _{ijkl}$, is a fourth-rank polar tensor and $d_{ijk}$ is the coefficient corresponding to the direct piezoelectric effect.

See also

• Piezoelectricity
• Ferroelectricity
• Ferroelasticity

External links

• Introduction to Flexoelectricity