Funding
NSF, DOE, ONR, state and industrial sources.
Research Activities
SMDL’s goal is to advance the understanding of basic science in field of piezoelectric and magnetoelectric materials by determining the synthesis-structure-property relationships at micro and nanoscale. We also have strength in application of the smart materials for applications ranging from components to functional prototypes. Following projects are currently in progress at SMDL:
Piezoelectric Energy Harvesting
The most efficient and practical method for realizing wireless sensor networks for applications such as structural health monitoring and security systems is to develop self-powered nodes by scavenging energy from the wasted mechanical vibrational energy – such as aircraft vibrations, automobiles, human body, and wind. Trapping the vibration energy to generate electricity at small scale can also evolve a new generation of distributed power sources. Our group is the leader in the piezoelectric energy harvesting technology with various harvester prototypes, such as “Piezoelectric Windmill” and “AutoPiezo”.
Magnetoelectric Composites
In the past few years, our group has done extensive research on magnetoelectric (ME) materials for magnetic field sensing applications, current measurement probes for high-power electric transmission systems, and energy generation. Currently, our focus is on developing the self assembled nanocomposites which can provide high ME coefficients at low frequency and DC bias field.
Piezoelectric Transformer Technology
The piezoelectric transformer offers several advantages compared to the electromagnetic ones such as higher electromechanical power density, no electromechanical noise, higher efficiency at resonance, miniaturization is possible, wide frequency range, nonflammable and simpler fabrication technique. Our study focuses on developing multi-layer piezoelectric voltage and power transformer for being used in energy efficient circuits.
Piezoresistive Materials
Recent discovery of giant piezoresistance in manganites at room temperature has prompted focused effort on developing compositions with higher force sensing coefficients. We have been successful in realizing compositions with high piezoresistive coefficients and correlating the performance with the microstructure.
Facilities
• Ceramic Processing
- Ball mills, sintering furnaces, single crystal growth
• Piezoelectric and Ferroelectric Characterization
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d33 meter, impedance analyzer, LCR meter
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picoamp current meter
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Temperature and stress dependent property measurement stages
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Sawyer Tower Circuit
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LVDT strain measurement system
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Laser Vibrometer
• Magnetoelectric Characterization
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Helmholtz coils and electromagnets to apply fields up to 1T
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Charge amplifier and lock-in amplifier
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Function generator, digital multimeter, oscilloscopes
Selected Publications
Priya, D. Fye and J. Zhand, “Piezoelectric Windmill – A novel solution to remote sensing”, Jpn. J. Appl. Phys. 44, 104-108 (2004).
S. Priya, A. Ando and K. Uchino, “Nonlead Perovskite Piezoelectric Materials”, Ceramic Trans. – Development in Dielectric Materials and Electronic Devices, 223 – 233 (2005).
J. Ryu, S. Priya, and K. Uchino, “Magnetoelectric Laminate Composites of Piezoelectric and Magnetostrictive Materials”, J. Electroceram. 8, 107 – 119 (2002).
S. Priya, S. Ural, H. W. Kim, K. Uchino and T. Ezaki, “Multilayered Unipoled Piezoelectric Transformers”, Jpn. J. Appl. Phys. 43, 3503–3510 (2004).
S. Priya, J. Ryu, K. Uchino, C. Ahn and S. Nahm, “Induction of Combinatory Characteristics by Relaxor Modification of Pb(Zr0.5Ti0.5)O3”, Appl. Phys. Lett. 83, 5020 – 5022 (2003).
