Isolated-Oxygen-Vacancy Hardening in Lead-Free Piezoelectrics.

Liu, Yi-Xuan; Qu, Wanbo; Thong, Hao-Cheng; Zhang, Yang; Zhang, Yunfan; Yao, Fang-Zhou; Nguyen, Trong Nghia; Li, Jia-Wang et al. · Adv Mater · 2022

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Defect engineering is a well-established approach to customize the functionalities of perovskite oxides. In demanding high-power applications of piezoelectric materials, acceptor doping serves as the state-of-the-art hardening approach, but inevitably deteriorates the electromechanical properties. Here, a new hardening effect associated with isolated oxygen vacancies for achieving well-balanced performances is proposed. Guided by theoretical design, a well-balanced performance of mechanical quality factor (Q<sub>m</sub> ) and piezoelectric coefficient (d<sub>33</sub> ) is achieved in lead-free potassium sodium niobate ceramics, where Q<sub>m</sub> increases by over 60% while d<sub>33</sub> remains almost unchanged. By atomic-scale Z-contrast imaging, hysteresis measurement, and quantitative piezoresponse force microscopy analysis, it is revealed that the improved Q<sub>m</sub> results from the inhibition of both extrinsic and intrinsic losses while the unchanged d<sub>33</sub> is associated with the polarization contributions being retained. More encouragingly, the hardening effect shows exceptional stability with increasing vibration velocity, offering potential in material design for practical high-power applications such as pharmaceutical extraction and ultrasonic osteotomes.