Influence of Nb and Zr co-doping on the structural, morphological and dielectric properties of CaCu3Ti4O12 ceramics

Abstract

In this work, CaCu3Ti3.8-xNb0.2ZrxO12 (where x=0.0, 0.05, 0.1, 0.2) ceramics were made using the normal solid-state reaction method to assess the influence of Nb5+ & Zr4+ codoping on the structure, morphology and electrical properties of CaCu3Ti4O12 ceramics. Reitveld refinement by Fullprof package was done to achieve the structural information. No phase transformation was observed upon doping. The CCTNZO ceramics occupied a finegrained microstructure with grain sizes ranges from 0.26-0.33 μm. Furthermore, grain size uniformity was enhanced with gradual doping of Zr4+ ion. within the meantime, the CCTNZO ceramics unfolds extensive durability of dielectric constant over a good range of frequency and also shows a lower loss factor. Doping resulted during a gradual decrease in grain sizes and a dielectric loss at low and high frequency. It had been found that 10% of Zr doped CCTNZO ceramics has the very best dielectric constant (3655) at 0.1 kHz. Meanwhile, rock bottom dielectric loss of 0.241 at 0.1 kHz was observed for 20% Zr doped CCTNZO ceramics.