A single crystal with nominal composition Pb(Mg 1/3 Nb 2/3 )O 3 -32PbTiO 3 (PMN-32PT) was grown by the Bridgman technique. Crystal orientation was determined using the rotating orientation X-ray diffraction (RO-XRD). Element distribution was measured along different directions using inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). The effect of the element segregation along axial and radial directions on the electrical properties of the PMN-32PT crystal was investigated. It is indicated that the electrical properties of the samples along the axial direction were strongly dependent on the PT (PbTiO 3 ) content. With the increase of the PT content, the piezoelectric coefficient and remnant polarization were improved. Differently, the electrical properties of the samples along the radial direction were mainly determined by the ratio of the Nb and Mg. The reasons for the element segregation and electrical properties varied with the composition were discussed.Crystals 2019, 9, 98 2 of 10 segregation along the radial direction and the reasons for the Nb and Mg segregation of the PMN-PT single crystals using the Bridgman technique was rarely reported in the literature.In this study, the single crystal with nominal compositional PMN-32PT was grown by the Bridgman technique. The element distribution along the axial and radial directions was confirmed by the inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). The effect of the element segregation along the axial and radial direction on the electrical properties of the PMN-32PT crystals was investigated. The reasons that the element segregation and electrical properties varied with the composition along the axial direction were also discussed.
Experimental ProcedureA PMN-32PT single crystal (Ø25 mm) was grown by the Bridgman method (Figure 1a). The crystal was faint yellow with good transparency. Some stress-induced cracks were presented on the top of the crystal. A sheet with a thickness of 0.8 mm was cut from the as-grown crystal boule along the axial direction (Figure 1b), which showed a poor uniformity in color. The sheet was divided along axial and radial directions with a size of 2 × 2 mm. The specimens were named as test points from Y1 to Y15 along the axial direction and test points from X1 to X4 along the radial direction. The Y9 and X4 test points were the same (shown in Figure 2).