High magnetic field sensitivity in Pb(Zr,Ti)O3-Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3 single crystal/Terfenol-D/Metglas magnetoelectric laminate composites

We report the magnetic field sensitivity results on five layer structure given as Metglas/Terfenol-D/PMN-PZT/Terfenol-D/Metglas, where PMN and PZT correspond to Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O-3 and Pb(Zr,Ti)O-3, respectively. The piezoelectric constant (d(33)) of poled PMN-PZT was found to be 1600 pC/N with dielectric constant of 5380 at 1 kHz. The sensitivity measurements were conducted after attaching individual layers in the laminate clearly delineating the effect occurring in the response. The magnetoelectric response for this five layer structure at 1 kHz was found to be 5 V/cm Oe at dc bias field of 1000 Oe under an ac drive of 1 Oe. At 1 kHz frequency, the sensor was able to deterministically measure step changes of 500 nT while at 10 Hz we can clearly identify the sensitivity of 1 mu T. These results are very promising for the cheap room-temperature magnetic field sensing technology. (C) 2010 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3406142]