Excellent electrical properties and high Curie temperature of the V2O5-modified Pb(Sc1/2Nb1/2)O3–Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3–PbTiO3 ferroelectric crystal

Abstract

In order to overcome the shortcomings, namely, low coercive field (E_C < 3 kV cm⁻¹) and low Curie temperature (T_C < 150 °C), of binary Pb(Mg_1/3Nb_2/3)O₃–PbTiO₃ relaxor ferroelectric crystals with a morphotropic phase boundary (MPB) composition, we successfully grew V₂O₅-doped ternary Pb(Sc_1/2Nb_1/2)O₃–Pb(Mg_1/3Nb_2/3)O₃–PbTiO₃ (V–PSN–PMN–PT) relaxor ferroelectric crystals with high piezoelectric coefficient d₃₃ ≈ 1600 pC/N, high Curie temperature T_C ≈ 174 °C, large coercive field E_C ≈ 7.5 kV cm⁻¹, and large strain S ≈ 0.42% at 3 kV mm⁻¹, which indicates the potential application of V–PSN–PMN–PT crystals in large power transducers and high temperature field. We characterized the phase structure of the V–PSN–PMN–PT crystals and the chemical valence of different elements by using Rietveld structure refinement and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy to determine that the excellent performances arise from the large lattice distortion and coexistence of monoclinic and tetragonal phases.