Characterization of thermo-optical properties of ferroelectric P(VDF-TrFE) copolymer using Febry-Perot interferometer

Phase transition in ferroelectric polymer is very interesting behavior and has been widely studied for real device applications, such as actuators and sensors. Through the phase transition, there is structural change resulting in the change of electrical and optical properties. In this study, we fabricated the Febry-Perot interferometer with the thin film of ferroelectric P(VDF-TrFE) 50/50 mol% copolymer, and thermo-optical properties were investigated. The effective thermo-optical coefficient of P(VDF-TrFE) was obtained as 2.3~3.8 ×10^-4/K in the ferroelectric temperature region (45°C~65°C) and 6.0×10^-4/K in the phase transition temperature region (65°C~85°C), which is a larger than optical silica-fiber and PMMA. The resonance transmission peak of P(VDF-TrFE) with the variation of temperature showed hysteretic variation and the phase transition temperature of the polymer in heating condition was higher than in the cooling condition. The elimination of the hysteretic phase transition of P(VDF-TrFE) is necessary for practical applications of optical devices.