Effect of Oxygen Annealing on the Electrical Properties of PBLZST Anti-ferroelectric Ceramics

Abstract

The effect of oxygen annealing on the electrical properties of (Pb 0.97Àx Ba x La 0.02 )(Zr 0.6 Sn 0.32 Ti 0.08 )O 3 (PBLZST) anti-ferroelectric (AFE) ceramics has been investigated through measuring its phase structure, electric field-induced polarization and dielectric properties. The oxygen annealing process can significantly improve the stability of the AFE phase and decrease the dielectric constant peaks. The saturation polarization of the PBLZST samples annealed in O 2 increases gradually when x < 0.085, but it decreases when x > 0.085. Compared with the conventional sintering method, the hysteresis switch fields of samples annealed in O 2 maintains the consistent stability, and the dielectric constant peaks drop drastically and are simultaneously broadened, except at x = 0.095. The Curie temperature decreases greatly after oxygen annealing when x is smaller than 0.08, but increases slightly when x is greater than 0.08. When x = 0.085, the difference of c/a ratios between the samples processed by the two methods reaches a maximum of about 0.00614, and the increment of the saturation polarization is 7 lC/cm 2 .