Ultrahigh energy storage performance in AN-based superparaelectric ceramics

Abstract

Ceramics capacitors, especially featuring antiferroelectric (AFE) structure, are widely used in pulsed power electronic systems due to distinctive high-power density and external field stability. Lead-free AFE material AgNbO3 has seized substantial research attention owing to its unique temperature driven multi-level phase transitions, and many works have greatly improved the energy storage properties by engineering these temperature-dependent phase boundaries. In this work, an ever-unadopted strategy was proposed to modulate the relaxor structure in AgNbO3 by designing room-temperature (RT) superparaelectric phase via Bi incorporation into AN lattice matrix. Structural analysis shows M phase (space group Pbcm) evolves into O phase (space group Cmcm) with 12 mol.% Bi-substitution, breaking the long-range AFE order into polar nanoregions. Hence, an ultra-high recoverable energy density (7.6 J/cm3) and a high efficiency (79 %) are simultaneously achieved in the Ag0.64Bi0.12NbO3 ceramics under 52.2 kV/mm. Moreover, the excellent energy storage properties are accompanied with good temperature and frequency stability, with the variation of Wrec less than ± 15% (over 25–120 °C) and ± 10% (over 1–200 Hz) under 25 kV/mm, respectively. The novel approach reported herein provides a new guidance for designing AgNbO3-based and other AFE materials for high-performance energy storage applications.