Fabrication of PbBi4Ti4O15 microplatelets with different TiO2 reactants

Abstract

Platelet PbBi4Ti4O15 (PBIT) microcrystals were fabricated by molten salt methods using different TiO2 crystal forms (anatase and rutile) as the reactants. The results showed that the pure PBIT phase can be obtained by using rutile as the reactant, while the PBIT and TiO2 phases coexisted when using anatase as the reactant. In comparison to anatase, the co-topping connection of rutile has better stability and accelerates the nucleation growth rate in a molten salt environment. Thus, PBIT microplatelets with the good crystallinity and plate-like morphology (aspect ratio of ~27) can be obtained when rutile is used as the reactant. Specifically, when using rutile as the reactant, a maximum d33∗ of ~153 pm/V can be obtained, which may potentially allow the fabrication of anisotropic perovskite templates for textured ceramics.