Modeling the Relative Dielectric Permittivity and Impedance of Carbon Nanotube Constituted Polymer Composites in the Sub-GHz Regime

Abstract

A model-based approach to characterize the electrical impedance of polymer matrices with carbon nanotube fillers, based on dielectric permittivity measurements in the sub-GHz regime, is proposed. In this context, an equivalent-series resistance (ESR) model, constituted of lumped resistances (R) and capacitances (C) is compared with distributed models such as a RC network and constant phase element (CPE) representations. It is shown, through detailed statistical analysis, that the CPE corresponding to a distribution/dispersion of relaxation times may best fit the experimental data. (C) 2012 The Electrochemical Society. [DOI: 10.1149/2.006301ssl] All rights reserved.