Material with variable viscoelasticity
AssigneeKabushiki Kaisha Toyota Chuo Kenkyusho
InventorsTohru Shiga, Norio Sato, Yoshiharu Hirose, Akane Okada, Takashi Ohta, Toshio Kurauchi
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Abstract
A material with variable viscoelasticity is composed of an electrically insulating polymeric material, and fine particles dispersed therein and capable of electric polarization under an applied electric field. The particles may, for example, be of a conjugated and unsaturated organic compound, a polyelectrolyte, or an organometallic complex salt. The material is capable of a reversible change of viscoelasticity depending on the intensity of the applied electric field.
Claims14
A material with electric field dependent viscoelasticity comprising a flexible electrically insulating polymeric material and fine particles uniformly dispersed in said polymeric material and occupying 5 to 60% by weight with respect to said polymeric material, said particles being capable of having polarizing induced by an external electric field and present in an amount capable of forming an electrically-crosslinked structure along the direction of said external electric field within said polymeric material and altering the viscoelasticity of said polymeric material by the use of force generated by electrically polarized particles, said polarization disappearing in the absence of said external electric field.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.