The experimental analysis on the driving characteristics of photo response torsion actuator

Abstract

The lanthanum-doped lead zirconate titanate ceramic is a well-known photostrictive material and has been studied extensively as wireless photo-controlled microactuators for its characteristic of photostrictive effect. However, the hysteresis phenomenon between photovoltage and photo-induced deformation has seriously hindered the application of the high-frequency dynamic field. The primary purpose of this article is to propose a photo response torsion actuator driven by opto-electrostatic hybrid driving method based on lanthanum-doped lead zirconate titanate ceramic to achieve the goal of rapid response regardless of the hysteresis phenomenon. To this end, this study observed the driving voltage, the relationship between the photovoltaic voltage of lanthanum-doped lead zirconate titanate ceramic and the deflection of the actuator, and the influence of different loads on driving characteristics through a series of experiments. From these experiments, the results indicate that when lanthanum-doped lead zirconate titanate ceramic is irradiated by ultraviolet light, the photovoltaic voltage with load is lower than that without load. The trend of deformation curves is in agreement with the trend of the driving voltage curves under different loads conditions. And the deformation of torsion actuator increases with the increase in light intensity. Therefore, the photo response torsion actuator driven by the opto-electrostatic hybrid driving method can control the deformation with rapid response speed effectively; meanwhile, the hysteresis phenomenon can be ignored.