Grain-Oriented Ferroelectric Ceramics with Single-Crystal-like Piezoelectric Properties and Low Texture Temperature

High-performance piezoelectrics are pivotal to various electronic applications including multilayer actuators, sensors, and energy harvesters. Despite the presence of high Lotgering factor F₀₀₁, two key limitations to today's relaxor-PbTiO₃ textured ceramics are low piezoelectric properties relative to single crystals and high texture temperature. In this work, Pb(Yb_1/2Nb_1/2)O₃-Pb(Mg_1/3Nb_2/3)O₃-PbTiO₃ (PYN-PMN-PT) textured ceramics with F₀₀₁ ∼ 99% were synthesized at only 975 °C through liquid-phase-assisted templated grain growth, where of particular significance is that single-crystal properties, i.e., very large electrostrain S_max/E_max ∼ 1830 pm V^-1, giant piezoelectric figure of merit d₃₃ × g₃₃ ∼ 61.3 × 10^-12 m² N^-1, high electromechanical coupling k₃₃ ∼ 0.90, and Curie temperature T_c ∼ 205 °C, were simultaneously achieved. Especially, the S_max/E_max and d₃₃ × g₃₃ values correspond to ∼180% enhancement as compared to the regularly 1200 °C-textured ceramics with F₀₀₁ ∼ 96%, representing the highest values ever reported on piezoceramics. Phase-field simulation revealed that grain misorientation has a stronger influence on piezoelectricity than texture fraction. The ultrahigh piezoelectric response achieved here is mainly attributed to effective control of grain orientation features and domain miniaturization. This work provides important guidelines for developing novel ceramics with significantly enhanced functional properties and low synthesis temperature in the future and can also greatly expand application fields of piezoceramics to high-performance, miniaturized electronic devices with multilayer structures.