A rate-dependent three-dimensional free energy model for ferroelectric single crystals

The one-dimensional free energy model for ferroelectric materials developed by Smith et al. Smith, R.C., Seelecke, S., Ounaies, Z., 2002. A free energy model for piezoceramic materials. In: 9th SPIE Conference on Smart Structures and Materials, San Diego, USA, pp. 17–22; Smith, R.C., Seelecke, S., Ounaies, Z., Smith, J., 2003. A free energy model for hysteresis in ferroelectric materials. J. Intell. Mater. Syst. Struct. 14, 719–739; Smith, R.C., Seelecke, S., Dapino, M.J., Ounaies, Z., 2005. A unified framework for modeling hysteresis in ferroic materials. J. Mech. Phys. Solids 54, 46–85] is generalized to three space dimensions including both polarization and strain. In the resulting nine-dimensional energy function, six free energy potentials representing the six distinct types of tetragonal variants of perovskite lattice structures are given as quadratic functions of polarization vector and strain tensor. Energy barrier expressions as functions of thermodynamic driving forces are obtained through a generalization of the one-dimensional equations derived from the model of Smith et al. This approach presents an alternative to the cumbersome determination of higher-dimensional saddle points and is attractive for a computationally efficient implementation. The energy barrier expressions are combined with evolution equations for the variant fractions based on the theory of thermally activated processes and thus allow for a natural treatment of rate-dependent effects. The predictions of the model are compared with recent measurements on BaTiO₃ single crystals by Burcsu et al. Burcsu, E., Ravichandran, G., Bhattacharya, K., 2004. Large electrostrictive actuation of barium titanate single crystals. J. Mech. Phys. 52, 823–846]. The effects of applied stress and 90°- and 180°-switching processes are discussed in detail.