Investigations of Secondary Contribution to Electrocaloric Effect in Relaxor PMN-PT Ceramic

Abstract

In this work, primary and secondary contributions to electrocaloric effect were investigated in a relaxor PMN-PT ceramic, by combining polarization and strain hysteretic measurements. Our results indicate that, although the ceramic shows a large electromechanical response, field-induced dimensional change (secondary effect) accounts for less than 19 % of the ceramic electrocaloric response over the 30-200 C temperature range. We believe that the method for the characterization of electrocaloric materials presented herein can provide valuable insights into the development of novel and optimized materials and heterostructures by tailoring primary and secondary contributions.