Physics Commons^™

Length Scales Of Interactions In Magnetic, Dielectric, And Mechanical Nanocomposites, Ralph Skomski, Balamurugan Balamurugan, Eva Schubert, Axel Enders, David J. Sellmyer

Axel Enders Publications

It is investigated how figures of merits of nanocomposites are affected by structural and interaction length scales, Aside from macroscopic effects without characteristic lengths scales and atomic-scale quantum-mechanical interactions there are nanoscale interactions that reflect a competition between different energy contributions. We consider three systems, namely dielectric media, carbon-black reinforced rubbers and magnetic composites. In all cases, it is relatively easy to determine effective materials constants, which do not involve specific length scales. Nucleation and breakdown phenomena tend to occur on a nanoscale and yield a logarithmic dependence of figures of merit on the macroscopic system size. Essential system-specific differences …