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Published on: February 9, 2017
Effect of sintering temperature on optical properties and microstructure of translucent zirconia prepared by
Haibin Zhang1, Byung-Nam Kim1, Koji Morita1
1Advanced Materials Processing Unit, National Institute for Materials Science, 1-2-1 Sengen, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-0047, Japan.
Abstract:
Aiming to characterize the effect of sintering temperature on transparency of zirconia, we have evaluated the optical properties and microstructure of translucent cubic zirconia prepared by high-pressure spark plasma sintering (SPS) at 1000-1200 ○C. Color centers (oxygen vacancies with trapped electrons) and residual pores were primary defects in the samples. In SPS samples, the total forward transmittance and in-line transmittance are mainly affected by color centers with a limited contribution from residual pores; in contrast, the changes in reflectance are only related to the porosity. The amounts of color centers and residual pores increase with sintering temperature that reduces the total forward and in-line transmittance of the as-sintered zirconia. Annealing in oxidizing atmosphere improves the total forward and in-line transmittance. During the annealing, the concentration of color centers decreases but the porosity increases.
