Dopant induced hollow BaTiO3 nanostructures for application in high performance capacitors

In this work, large-scale single crystalline Nd-doped BaTiO3 hollow nanoparticles have been synthesized via a simple hydrothermal method without the assistance of a surfactant or high temperature sintering. With unique hollow structures, the nanoparticles not only exhibit excellent compatibility with poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF), but significantly enhanced the dielectric properties of the nanocomposites. We demonstrated that the dielectric constant of the nanocomposite reached up to 480.3 with dielectric loss of 0.6 at 10(2) Hz. Design and optimization of the synthesis method have been achieved through a systematic study of the effect of reaction conditions on the size and morphology evolution of the hollow nanoparticles. The formation of hollow nanostructures is proposed to follow a Kirkendall induced hollowing mechanism which is governed by the differences in diffusion rates of dopant ions, water molecules and core ions during the synthesis reaction.