Substitutionally driven phase transition and enhanced multiferroic and electrical properties of (1−x) BiFeO3 – (x) Pb(Zr0.52Ti0.48)O3 ceramics (0.0 ≤ x ≤ 1.00)

Abstract

Polycrystalline samples with compositions 0.0 ≤ x ≤ 1.00 in the (1−x) BiFeO3 – (x) Pb(Zr0.52Ti0.48)O3 system were successfully synthesized by sol-gel method. Rietveld analysis of XRD data confirms the compositional driven phase transition from rhombohedral (R3c) for x = 0.0 to tetragonal (P4mm) for x = 1.0 via intermediate monoclinic phases with Cc and Cm symmetry and co-existence of two ferroelectric phases as well in these ceramics. Remanent magnetization is found to be maximum for x = 0.30 and remanent polarization has increased gradually with x up to x = 1.0. Substantial decrease in dielectric loss and leakage current density has been observed which is due to the suppression of defects like bismuth and oxygen vacancies with increasing x.