An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of

Binary Composites
H. Sami S oz uer
E-mail: sozuer@photon.iyte.edu.tr
Physics Department, Izmir Institute of Technology Gulbahce Kampusu, Urla, Izmir, Turkey
Abstract. A simple model for the long wavelength effective dielectric constant of a binary
dielectric mixture is proposed. The model in its crudest form gives the Wiener bounds, and a
more rened version yields tight upper and lower bounds on the effective dielectric constant.
An average of these bounds approximates the Maxwell-Garnett result for a binary mixture,
with an error of at most 15% at a dielectric contrast of 10000. The model can be generalized
to estimate the effective dielectric constant of an arbitrary inhomogeneous medium.
PACS numbers: 41.20.Jb,42.25.Bs,78.20.-e
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 2
The long wavelength effective dielectric constant of composite materials has been an
active area of research since the early 20th century, when J. C. Maxwell-Garnett derived his
famous formula[1] for a mixture in which isolated guest particles with a dielectric constant

a
are embedded in a host medium of dielectric constant
b
, the so-called cermet topology.
For particles of spherical shape, the Maxwell-Garnett (MG) formula reads

e
=
b
+ 3f
b

a
+ 2
b
f(
a

b
)
(1)
where f is the volume lling fraction of the guest particles. Several extensions have been
made on the MG formula, especially to account for particles with spheroidal and ellipsoidal
shapes, for metallic particles in a host medium[2], for periodic structures[3] and to account
for the effects of absorption[4].
A mathematically identical problem is that of nding the effective DC conductivity of
composites. To see this, we recall that for the effective dielectric problem, the displacement
eld D = E, and inside the charge-free dielectric medium
D =
free
= 0
For the effective conductivity problem of ohmic composites, we have, for the current density,
J = E, where is the conductivity. Also, the continuity equation yields, for the DC case
J =

t
= 0
Using Gauss theorem, one can show that the normal components of D and J should be
continuous across the boundary between dissimilar materials. Thus, the same approach can
be used also in the calculation of the conductivity of inhomogeneous composites[5]. MG
theory has also been successfully applied to the problem of acoustic wave propagation in
inhomogeneous media[6]. Feynman[8] gives a number of interesting examples of physical
phenomena, such as heat conduction, neutron diffusion, and irrotational heat ow that can be
treated using the mathematical methods of electrostatics. Thus the same methods developed
for the effective dielectric constant can successfully be applied to such problems when the
medium is inhomogeneous.
MG formula fails for composite media where the constituents are distributed on a
symmetric footing and a host-guest distinction cannot be made. These types of media are
said to have the network topology. For these media, a number of formulations of
e
exist, the
best-known being the Bruggeman expression[7], widely referred to as the effective medium
theory
f

a

a
+ 2
e
+ (1 f)

b

b
+ 2
e
= 0 (2)
while the Lorentz-Lorenz effective medium approximation, familiar from many textbooks[8,
9] reads

e
1

e
+ 2
= f

a
1

a
+ 2
+ (1 f)

b
1

b
+ 2
(3)
Aspnes[10] gives an excellent readable review and interesting alternate derivations of the
Bruggeman, Lorentz-Lorenz and Maxwell-Garnett formulas that casts them within a common
framework.
Another well-known formulation by Looyenga[11] reads

e
= f
1/3
a
+ (1 f)
1/3
b
(4)
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 3

b
(a)

a

b
(b)
Figure 1. The material sandwiched between the two plates of a capacitor (a) in series, and, (b)
in parallel.
The complexity of the mathematical methods used in these studies makes the subject
seem unapproachable to the undergraduate student, who may not be equipped with the
necessary mathematical sophistication. Unfortunately, this hides the fundamental simplicity
of the underlying physics, which can be understood by constructing simple models for the
inhomogeneous medium.
1. The Capacitor Model
We adopt the experimental approach to measuring the effective dielectric constant
e
of a
composite medium by simply sandwiching it between the plates of a parallel plate capacitor,
with plate separation d and surface area A, and measuring the capacitance. If d is small
enough, i.e. d

A, one can ignore the fringing elds and the capacitance C would be
approximately given by
C =
e
A
d
from which
e
can be calculated.
We adopt the same approach, and calculate C by assuming the simplest possible
geometry for the composite medium rst. Clearly, the precise positions and the geometric
shape of the guest material would be necessary to nd the exact value for C.
2. Two Capacitor model
To model a composite medium where the volume lling fraction of the guest material
with dielectric constant
a
is f, we rst consider the simplest and crudest model where the
geometry of the medium is completely ignored and the two materials are considered as slabs
positioned either in series or in parallel as shown in Fig.1. One would then have, with
d
a
= fd, and d
b
= (1 f)d for the serial case
C
a
=
a
A
fd
and C
b
=
b
A
(1 f)d
With the equivalent capacitance 1/C = 1/C
a
+ 1/C
b
,
d
A
e
=
fd
A
a
+
(1 f)d
A
b

e
=
f

a
+
1 f

b
=

Hence

e
=
1

(5)
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 4
where we have dened (r) 1/(r), and denotes spatial averaging.
For the parallel case, the total area of the plate is split between the two types of materials
with A
a
= fA, and A
b
= (1 f)A, so that
C
a
=
a
fA
d
and C
b
=
b
(1 f)A
d
Thus C = C
a
+ C
b
, so

e
A
d
=
a
fA
d
+
b
(1 f)A
d
which yields

e
= f
a
+ (1 f)
b
= (6)
The values obtained from the two 2C models,
e
= and
e
= 1/ , are the
maximum and the minimum values that
e
can assume for any composite dielectric medium.
Interestingly enough, both of these values, known as the Wiener bounds[12] can be realized
for the same medium: a multilayer dielectric structure where dielectric slabs are stacked
along the z-axis, or, even more generally, when the dielectric constant varies only along one
direction, say the z-axis, i.e., if (r) = (z). For waves propagating along the z-axis, the
electric eld would be parallel to the interface between the layers, and so
e
= . When
the waves propagate in a direction perpendicular to the z-axis, the electric eld can have a
component parallel to the interface, in which case one has, for the effective long wavelength
dielectric constant
e
= as before. In addition, though, the electric eld can have a
component which is parallel to the z-axis, in which case
e
= 1/ 1/.
These bounds differ by quite a bit when the dielectric contrast between the constituent
materials is high, and in addition the 2C model does not distinguish between the host and
the guest materials. This is reected in Eqs. 5 and 6 as the a and the b type materials appear
on an equal footing. Thus we seek a more rened model to represent the medium, one that
will distinguish between the host and the guest materials.
3. Three Capacitor Models

a
C
1
C
2

b
C
3
C
1
C
2
C
3
(a)

a
C
1
C
2

b
C
3
C
2
C
1
C
3
(b)
Figure 2. (a) A cubical material of dielectric constant a and side a embedded in a host
medium of dielectric constant
b
. The dielectric is sliced horizontally and approximated by
3 capacitors. (b) The same cubical material of dielectric constant a and side a embedded in
a host medium of dielectric constant
b
. Here, a vertical section of dimensions a a d is
carved out of the dielectric to construct the 3 capacitors.
Lets try a geometry where the guest material has a cubical shape of side a and is
fully embedded in the host material. This will hopefully yield a result that distinguishes
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 5
between the host and the guest materials. However, we are now faced with the non-
trivial problemof calculating the capacitance for this geometry. This, strictly speaking, would
require solving a complicated boundary value problem for the electric potential subject to the
boundary conditions that the potential on each plate be constant. A problem like this, except
under very special circumstances, would require a numerical solution which would offer little
insight.
Fortunately, there is a simple, albeit crude way of calculating the capacitance for such
a geometry, by slicing the material in between the plates so each piece can be considered
as a parallel plate capacitor. There are two ways in which this can be done, by slicing the
medium horizontally, that is, parallel to the plates, or vertically, perpendicular to the plates.
Clearly both are approximations to the actual capacitance of the capacitor shown in Fig.2a,
but considering the ease with which the calculations can be done, it may well be worth the
effort. We will show later that the two values thus obtained are in fact a pair of upper and
lower bounds for the actual value of
eff
.
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1

e
f
f
volume filling fraction of dielectric material
2C Parallel
3C-Ihcubic void
3C-h
MG spherical void
MG
3C-v cubic void
3C-v
3C-h dielectric cube
3C-h
MG dielectric sphere
MG
3C-v dielectric cube
3C-v
2C Serial 1/
Figure 3. The effective dielectric constant
e
calculated using the 2 capacitor model and
1/ . Also plotted are the
e
values calculated from the two different 3 capacitor models
(
3C
) for cubical dielectric particles in air, and cubic air voids in a dielectric host.
MG
are
the effective dielectric constants calculated with the Maxwell-Garnett formula for spherical
dielectric particles in air, and for spherical air voids in a dielectric host. = 13 for the
dielectric material and = 1 for air, for all cases. The lling ratio f is the volume lling
fraction of the high dielectric material = 13. The vertical order of the legend reects the
vertical position of each curve.
3.1. Horizontal Slicing
We rst slice the material horizontally into three pieces, parallel to the plates, as indicated by
the dashed lines in Fig.2a, such that the cube remains fully at the central slab. The cube with
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 6
capacitance C
1
can nowbe considered parallel to C
2
, the capacitance of what remains after the
cube has been taken out of the central slice. Finally the remaining top and bottom slices can
be combined to yield C
3
, which can be considered in series with the C
1
-C
2
combination.Thus
C
1
=
a
a
2
a
, C
2
=
b
A a
2
a
and C
3
=
b
A
d a
Since C
1
and C
2
are in parallel and the combination is in series with C
3
, C = (C
1
+
C
2
)C
3
/(C
1
+ C
2
+ C
3
). In order to accomodate all values of f in the interval (0,1) we
need to assume each plate is square with side d. Then, with f = a
3
/d
3
,
e
can be calculated

3C-h
=

b
[f
2/3
(
a

b
) +
b
]

b
+ (f
2/3
f)(
a

b
)
(7)
0
20
40
60
80
100
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1

e
f
f
volume filling fraction of dielectric material
Spherical void: Maxwell-Garnett
Cubic Void: Average of 3C-h and 3C-v
Dielectric Cube: Average of 3C-h and 3C-v
Dielectric Sphere: Maxwell-Garnett
Figure 4. A comparison of the average of the 3C-h and 3C-v results with the Maxwell-Garnett
results for a dielectric contrast of 100. Our results and the MG results are too close to visually
distinguish for dielectric inclusions in air (lowest curve).
3.2. Vertical Slicing
An alternate model, depicted in Fig.2b, again with 3 capacitors, can be constructed by carving
a vertical section of the dielectric which contains the cube. The capacitance of the cube is
again C
1
. The remaining top and bottom slices can be combined into C
2
, which can be
considered in series with C
1
. The very outer segment left over after the central piece is
removed, has capacitance C
3
which is in parallel with the C
1
-C
2
combination. Thus
C
1
=
a
a
2
a
, C
2
=
b
a
2
d a
and C
3
=
b
A a
2
d
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 7
which yields C = C
3
+ C
1
C
2
/(C
1
+ C
2
), from which we obtain

3C-v
= (1 f
2/3
)
b
+
f
2/3

b
(1 f
1/3
)
a
+ f
1/3

b
(8)
The results are plotted in Fig.3. For both dielectric inclusions in air, and voids in a
dielectric, its clear that 3C-h and 3C-v models formupper and lower bounds for the Maxwell-
Garnett result.
Both of the 3C models are equally plausible, and we dont have any reason to favor one
over the other, so it seems plausible to take the average of the two
e
values calculated with
the two methods, as the best estimate of
eff

3C
=
1
2
(
3C-h
+
3C-v
) (9)
which is plotted in Fig.4. Our results for the 3 capacitor model are quite close to the Maxwell-
Garnett results. both for dielectric inclusions in air, and for voids in a dielectric. Even at a
dielectric contrast of 10
4
, the maximum % difference between the MG result, Eq.1, and the
3C result, Eq.9 is 15% for dielectric inclusions in air, and 2.5% for voids in dielectric.
4. Network Topology
Encouraged by the excellent agreement of the 3C-model with the Maxwell-Garnett formula,
we now turn to structures with the network topology, where the two dissimilar media are both
connected. One such medium is the periodic scaffold structure where dielectric rods of
square cross section with side a, intersect at right angles as shown in Fig.5. This a periodic
structure with the periodicity of the simple cubic lattice and both types of materials are
connected. In fact at a lling ratio of f = 0.5, both regions become identical in geometry.
For this structure,
eff
can be calculated to a high accuracy by the plane wave method, which
involves diagonalization of matrices of order 10
4
[13]. The capacitor model for
e
can
Figure 5. A unit cell of the simple cubic scaffold structure.
again be constructed by horizontal and vertical slicing of the 3D cross shape shown in
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 8
Fig.5, since an exact calculation of capacitance would again require solving a complicated
boundary value problem. Hence we will again approximate the capacitance by slicing the
material horizontally and vertically, and will take the average as our best estimate. We
choose a 111 cubic volume of the material sandwiched between plates for the calculation
of capacitance. Horizontal slicing yields
C
1a
=
a
a
2
1 a
in parallel with C
1b
=
b
1 a
2
1 a
(10)
in series with
C
2a
=
a

a
2
+ 4a(
1a
2
)

a
in parallel with C
2b
=
b
4(
1a
2
)
2
a
(11)
so that

4C-h
= C =
(C
1a
+ C
1b
)(C
2a
+ C
2b
)
(C
1a
+ C
1b
) + (C
2a
+ C
2b
)
(12)
with f = 3a
2
2a
3
. Similarly, vertical slicing yields
0
20
40
60
80
100
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1

e
f
f
volume filling fraction of dielectric material
exact
4C-average
Looyenga
Bruggeman
Figure 6. A comparison of the average of the 4C-h and 4C-v results (long-dashed) with the
exact results using plane wave expansions (solid), and the Bruggeman (short-dashed) and
Looyenga (dotted) formulas for the scaffold structure. The dielectric contrast is 100. Our
results and the exact results are too close to visually distinguish for f < 0.5.
C
1a
=
a
a
2
1
in parallel with C
1b
= 4
b
(
1a
2
)
2
1
(13)
in parallel with
C
2a
= 4
a
(
1a
2
)
a
in series with C
2b
=
b
a(
1a
2
)
1 a
(14)
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 9
which yields,

4C-v
= C = C
1a
+ C
1b
+
C
2a
C
2b
C
2a
+ C
2b
(15)
As before, we have no reason to prefer one way of calculating C over the other, so we
average the two to obtain our best estimate

4C
=
1
2
(
4C-h
+
4C-v
) (16)
With f = 3a
2
2a
3
for the scaffold structure, we let a take on values in the range [0, 1] and
plot
4C
vs f, along with the exact value obtained from the plane wave calculations in Fig.6.
Also plotted are the two widely used expressions for
e
, one by Bruggeman[7] and
another by Looyenga[11]. For f < 0.6, the 4C model agrees very well with the exact result,
while the Bruggeman and Looyenga formulas seem to be quite far off. For f > 0.6, the 4C
model is still reasonably close, while the Bruggeman formula yields the best approximation
to the exact result.
5. Generalization to arbitrary inhomogeneous dielectric structures
Suppose we could calculate the actual potential, (x, y, z) in a representative unit cube
sample of an arbitrary inhomogeneous of dielectric material sandwiched between two
conducting plates kept at a potential difference V . If we set up an orthogonal curvilinear
coordinate system (u, v, w) such that the potential is constant for a given w, and (u, v) is
constant along an electric eld line, then we could calculate the exact value of the capacitance,
and hence the exact value of the effective dielectric constant of the inhomogeneous medium
sandwiched between the plates. To do this, we divide the inhomogeneous dielectric up into
small volume elements of area dA located at the equipotential surfaces w and w+dw, and of
thickness d, as depicted in Fig.7. If we now imagine placing perfectly conducting plates of
d
l

(w)
(w+dw)
dA
Figure 7. Equipotential surfaces and a small capacitor dC with plates of area dA sandwiched
between the equipotential surfaces (w) and (w + dw) with plate separation d =
d/||.
area dA at adjacent equipotential surfaces, then
dC = (u, v, w)
dA
d
(17)
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 10
For the equivalent problem of conductance, one makes the substitutions C G and
where G 1/R is the conductance of a resistor formed by sandwiching a unit cube between
two perfectly conducting plates to form a resistor with conductance
dG = (u, v, w)
dA
d
(18)
where dA is chosen such that the displacement current DdA (actual current JdA for the
conductance problem), is constant as w varies at xed (u, v), thus forming a current thread
from the positive to the negative plate. The total capacitance (conductance) of this system of
tiny capacitors(resistors) can be calculated using any one of two equivalent ways.
One way is to rst connect the capacitors (conductances) for a given value of w, that
is between the equipotential surfaces and + d in parallel. This yields, for the inverse
capacitance (conductance) of the sheet between the equipotential surfaces and + d

dC
1
dG
1

=
1

EPS
dA
d

(u, v, w)
(u, v, w)
(19)
where the surface integral is performed over an equipotential surface (EPS). We now connect
these in series, i.e., sum the inverse capacitances (conductances) to obtain

C
1
G
1

CCT

EPS
dA
d

(u, v, w)
(u, v, w)

(20)
where, it is understood that the d integral is to be performed along displacement eld lines,
with dA being the area element enclosed by the same bundle of eld lines, thus forming
a constant current thread (CCT) all the way from the positive to the negative plate, and
d = d/|| is the separation between the equipotential surfaces (w) and (w + dw).
Alternately, we could rst have connected the capacitors for xed (u, v) in series, to
obtain the capacitance of the constant current thread

dC
dG

1
dA
d

(u, v, w)
(u, v, w)

(21)
and then connect the resulting capacitors in parallel, i.e., sum over (u, v). This yields

C
G

1
dA
d

(u, v, w)
(u, v, w)

(22)
That both ways of calculating the capacitance (conductance) are completely equivalent
can readily be shown. Starting with Eq.18
dG=(u, v, w)
dA
d
=(u, v, w)||
dA
d
=J
dA
d
=
dI
d
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 11
Eq.20 becomes
1
G
=

JdA

1
I

=
V
I
(23)
where the last step follows fromthe fact that the total current through any equipotential surface
is independent of the value of .
Similarly, one obtains for Eq.22
G =

d
(u, v, w)||dA

d
dI

dI

=
I
V
(24)
where, again, the last step follows fromthe fact that dI is independent of the value of . Thus,
both calculations yield the same value for C.
5.1. Planar Equipotential and Vertical Current Approximations
The calculation of the potential for an arbitray inhomogeneous dielectric mediumcan be rather
tedious, so we look for an approximation instead. The simplest is to assume that the potential
is a function only of z, the cartesian coordinate perpendicular to the plates of the capacitor.
Then the coordinate system (u, v, w) reduces to (x, y, z) and the two formulas above reduce
to the horizontal and vertical slicing formulas of the previous sections, respectively.
Using a unit cube of the inhomogeneous material sandwiched between two perfectly
conducting plates at z = 1/2, we can now write the more general expression for the
horizontal slicing approximation:
1
C
h
=

dz

dxdy (x, y, z)

(25)
Alternately, another simplication could be to assume that the displacement current D
or the real current J is vertical, resulting in the vertical slicing approximation
C
v
=

dxdy

dz
(x, y, z)

(26)
In all our calculations, the actual values of
eff
, as calculated by the plane wave
method using a large basis, always fell between
eff-v
and
eff-h
, and this is indeed true for
any inhomogeneous medium. While a rigorous proof is possible, we here present a proof
based essentially on concepts from freshman physics.
To show that C
h
C, one needs to observe that horizontally slicing the medium,
and calculating the capacitance of each thin slice and then combining the slices in series is
equivalent to placing perfectly conducting thin metal sheets between the slices. Now, its well-
known that a capacitor would suck in a dielectric or a conducting sheet into it. So if one starts
with a capacitor with constant charge Q, and inserts a thin horizontal perfectly conducting
plate in between the plates of the capacitor, one does negative work and thus lowers the total
energy stored in the capacitor. Hence the nal energy U
f
= Q
2
/2C
h
is less than the initial
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 12
R
1
R
2
R
3
R
4
(a)
R
1
R
2
R
3
R
4
(b)
Figure 8. (a) The conducting medium sliced into two vertical threads, with each thread
represented by two resistors. (b) As the two threads are physically brought into contact, lateral
connections are formed between threads. Here, the lateral connection is represented by the
horizontal wire connecting the centers of the two threads.
energy U
i
= Q
2
/2C, leading to C
h
C, the equality applying only when is a function of
z only.
To see that C
h
C, its best to switch to the equivalent problem of conductance, and
show that G
h
G. In the actual resistor made up of the material with inhomogeneous
conductance, the current density J, will, in general, have nonzero lateral components, that
is, J
x
> 0 and J
y
> 0. By vertically slicing the medium, we are, in effect, cutting
physically separated vertical threads, thus forcing J to a vertical direction. Lets consider
any two adjacent threads as depicted in Fig.8a. As these threads are brought into physical
contact, horizontal currents will form as the potential difference at the same z for two
neighboring threads will not, in general, be the same. Lets divide each thread into two
segments horizontally, midway between the plates, with resistances R
1
and R
2
on the left
thread, and R
3
and R
4
on the right thread. As these two threads are brought into physical
contact, there will be lateral connections, which we represent by adding a horizontal wire, as
shown in Fig.8b. The equivalent resistance of the two cases can be calculated easily
R
v
=
(R
1
+ R
2
)(R
3
+ R
4
)
R
1
+ R
2
+ R
3
+ R
4
R=
R
1
R
3
R
1
+ R
3
+
R
2
R
4
R
2
+ R
4
R
v
R=
(R
2
R
3
R
1
R
4
)
2
(R
1
+R
3
)(R
2
+R
4
)(R
1
+R
2
+R
3
+R
4
)
0
Thus any lateral connection between the threads would decrease the total resistance, hence
increasing the conductance. We therefore conclude that G
v
G, or, equivalently, that
C
v
C where Gand C are the actual values of the conductance and capacitance, respectively.
Combining the two inequalities, and noting that, for a unit cubic volume, C =
eff
, we
conclude that

eff-v

eff

eff-h
(27)
Notice that if the potential difference at the two ends of the connecting wire is zero, that is, if
= (z) only, then R
v
= R
h
= R, and both ways of calculating the conductance are the
same.
6. Conclusion
Considering the simplicity of the approach, its remarkable that one can get results with
accuracy comparable to, or sometimes even better than well-established formulas derived
An Intuitive Approach to the Effective Dielectric Constant of Binary Composites 13
using complicated models. One reason for this is that the geometry information, which
is missing in other models is necessarily integrated into the calculations in the two models
presented here. The vertical and horizontal slicing models yield upper and lower bounds for
the actual value of the effective dielectric constant, for which the best bet estimate would be
a simple average of the two bounds. While the actual value of the effective dielectric constant
would, in general, be closer to one or the other limit, we nd that the average is indeed an
excellent approximation in many cases of interest.
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