Structural, dielectric and electrical properties of Ba/Zr modified BiFeO₃ electroceramics

The preliminary structural and frequency-temperature dependence of dielectric and electrical characteristics of Ba/Zr modified Bismuth ferrite(BiFeO₃) i.e.(Bi_1-xBa_x)(Fe_1-xZr_x)O₃; x = 0.05, 0.1, 0.15, 0.20 at room temperature have been reported. The samples are produced in a perovskite rhombohedral structure, according to the X-ray diffraction pattern and analysis of room temperature XRD data. The SEM photographs are useful for the micro-structural view of the synthesized compounds. Dielectric and electrical characteristics across a wide temperature range 25 °C to 300 °C at different frequencies ranging from 1 kHz to 1 MHz have provided many important results including dielectric dispersion, conduction mechanism, relaxation process and ferroelectricity of the prepared samples. The contributions of grains and grain boundaries towards the net resistance and capacitance of the samples are found from the Nyquist plots. The types of conduction mechanism have been studied from ac-conductivity study of the samples. The Ohmic behaviour is verified by the J–E characteristics of the prepared samples, which have a slope closer to 1. The electrical polarization study through hysteresis loops at room temperature confirms the ferroelectric behavior of the studied materials. According to the experimental results obtained here, the synthesized materials could be beneficial as electronic components in the electronic industries.