Growth mechanism of textured YBa 2Cu 3O 7-x superconductor performed by the melt texture growth

Abstract

This work deals with the influence of the starting Y-123 grain size on the growth mechanism and final microstructure of the melt-textured YBa 2Cu 3O 7-x ceramics. It is found that the final 211 inclusion size increases as the starting 123 grain size increases. However using a small-grained 123 precursor disrupts the growth front and makes the control of grain alignment difficult. An appropriate morphology of the 123 precursor should be chosen priori to the MTG process in order to obtain the best performance.