A constitutive model for ferroelectric polycrystals (Q1968709)

A constitutive model is developed for nonlinear switching properties of ferroelectric polycrystals acted upon by a combination of stresses and electric fields. In this micro-macro approach, all tools of the recently developed micromechanics of materials are exploited. The polycrystal is viewed as a set of bonded crystals, each of which comprising a set of distinct crystal variants allowed by crystal symmetries. The switching converts one crystal variant into another one, thus giving rise to a progressive change in remanent strain and electric polarization, and to a change in the average linear electromechanical properties (piezoelectricity). This switching is resisted by the dissipative motion of separating domain walls. This is very much inspired by the crystal elastoplasticity of shape-memory alloys. Furthermore, following basic ideas of R. Hill (tangent modulus) and others (J. D. Eshelby, J. W. Hutchinson), a self-consistent scheme is given to estimate the macroscopic response of tetragonal crystals (e.g., lead titanate)) under a variety of loading paths. Finally, the evolution of switching surface (the analog of a plasticity surface) in stress-electric space is calculated. The analysis offers a rather satisfactory representations of qualitative features of ferroelectric switching. The authors consider a restricted bibliography issued essentially from some British and American research groups. They would have much benefited from the early works of \textit{P. J. Chen} et al. (1980s) on electromechanical switching and \textit{G. A. Maugin} and co-workers on electromechanical couplings and coupled electromechanical hysteresis in ferroelectrics -- described by means of internal variables of state by analogy with anelastic behavior (decomposition of both strain and electric polarization fields in terms of reversible and remanent parts) -- for all these works see the book by \textit{G. A. Maugin} et al. [Nonlinear electromechanical couplings, J. Wiley, Chichester and New York (1992)], chapter 6 and references therein. Notions analogous to some of those expanded in the appendix A were also dealt with much before by \textit{S. A. Zhou}, \textit{R. K. T. Hsieh} and \textit{G. A. Maugin} [Int. J. Solids Struct. 22, 1411-1422 (1986; Zbl 0604.73111)]. Correct mobile interface electromechanical conditions and associated driving forces are given not in \textit{Jiang} (1994) but in \textit{G. A. Maugin} and \textit{C. Trimarco} [Math. Mech. Solids 2, 199-214 (1997)]. This may be useful for an improved modelling accounting for what occurs on grain boundaries.