Detection of Charge around a Nanoparticle in a Nanodielectric

The improvement of dielectric properties of a polymer through addition of nanofillers is considered to be primarily due to the interface formed around the nanoparticle embedded in polymeric matrix. Researchers have attempted indirect methods to detect the interfacial region and suggested that an interfacial region of finite thickness and permittivity different from filler and bulk matrix exists. An electrical double layer of charge around each nanoparticle is also hypothesized. In the current computational study, a Finite Element Method (FEM) based model is used to simulate the experimental set-up for Electrostatic Force Microscopy (EFM) and to generate computationally the EFM phase images. The efficacy of this model in detecting charge around a nanoparticle is studied.