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Published on: February 9, 2017
Ordered Domains and Microwave Properties of Sub-micron Structured Ba(Zn1/3Ta2/3)O₃ Ceramics Obtained by Spark Plasma
Fei Liu1,2, Shaojun Liu3,4, Xuejiao Cui5
1Shenzhen Research Institute, Central South University, Shenzhen 518057, China. 163311042@csu.edu.cn.
Abstract:
The degree of Zn2+ and Ta5+ ions ordering could play an important role in the dielectric loss in Ba(Zn1/3Ta2/3)O₃ (BZT) ceramics. However, the influence of the grain size of Ba(B'1/3B″2/3)O₃ ceramics with nano or sub-micron grains on the ordering domains structure is still not clear. In the present paper, highly dense (~98%) BZT microwave dielectric ceramics with homogeneous sub-micron structure (~330 nm) were prepared through spark plasma sintering (SPS). High resolution transmission electron microscopy combined with X-ray diffraction (XRD)clearly showed that the B-site ordering structure of sintered BZT samples by SPS becomes the B-site long-range 1:2 ordering as annealing proceeds. In contrast, the short-range 1:2 ordering in non-annealed counterparts was also present, which was not detectable by XRD. The size of B-site ordering domains enlarged with annealing temperature. The sub-micron structure of sintered BZT ceramics by SPS remained stable at up to 1400 C; however, the size of B-site 1:2 ordering domain was more than five times larger, which led to a significant increase of the quality factor (Q·f) to 37,700 GHz from 15,000 GHz.
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