Effective permittivity of periodic composite materials: Numerical modeling by the finite element method

The effective properties of composite materials are closely related to the composition and arrangement of its constituents. Many studies and articles are actively studying the dielectric properties of heterogeneous structures with random and periodic arrangement. In the quasistatic limit, we use the finite element method as a numerical tool to evaluate the effective permittivity of two and three component composites. Two heterostructures are investigated; the first is formed by crossed dielectric cylinders in permanent contact and arranged in three layers. The cylinders are immersed in a dielectric host medium. The second structure is similar to the first except that the tubes are covered by an interphase layer. The numerical tool used to extract the exact value of the effective permittivity takes into account all internal multipolar interactions which contribute to the polarization of the material medium. The impacts of the relative permittivity and volume fraction of cylinders, the thickness of interphase and its dielectric constant are reported. The Maxwell–Garnett theory fails to predict the effective permittivity of the studied structures for high volume fraction and permittivity contrast. To overcome this problem, an amendment was made to the McLachlan equation McQ also termed the Two Exponent Single Percolation Equation TESPE. The first exponent t is held equal to 1 and the other exponent s is depending on the volume fraction. s is calculated so that the whole values of the effective permittivity obtained by the McQ rule are exactly the same values obtained by the simulations. Finally, we obtained a chart and a model to find the values of s, a fast way that is very useful for practitioners and design engineers of composite materials.

► Effective permittivity study of reinforced composite with dielectric cylinders.
► Maxwell equation predicts effective permittivity just for very dilute limit.
► From an obtained model based on McLachlan equation, one retrieves all simulation data.
► Effect of interphase permittivity on the effective dielectric constant is observed.
► No practical effect of interphase thickness for high permittivity contrast.