Electrical Properties of Solid Insulating Polymers by Thermally Stimulated Discharge Method

Abstract

The electrical phenomena in solid insulating polymers are intimately linked to their physical morphology and microstructure, their temperature and the time at which the observations are made with respect to time at which the stimulus was first applied. In this paper, the authors present a brief account of various transport mechanisms and the methods of investigation. Among several experimental techniques for investigation of electrical conduction, the decay methods, time of flight methods, and contact electrification are briefly described. This is then followed by a detailed description of thermally stimulated discharge technique for investigation of traps, space charges and dipole processes in polymers. In order to illustrate the usefulness of this technique, experimental results will be presented to demonstrate the existence of deep interface hole traps in double layer amorphous semiconductor photoreceptors.