Structure, dielectric and multiferroic properties of three-layered aurivillius SrBi3Nb2FeO12 ceramics

Single-Phase Aurivillius SrBi3Nb2FeO12 ceramics were prepared by conventional solid-state method. BiFeO3 was successfully introduced into SrBi2Nb2O9 which was confirmed by XRD and Raman results. Plate-like morphology grains which are 400-600 nm in thickness and 2-4 mu m in length were observed for SrBi3Nb2FeO12 ceramics. Their permittivity and dielectric loss at 1 MHz are about 135 and 0.018, respectively. Two permittivity peaks were observed in the temperature dependent permittivity curves. Ferroelectric and weak antiferromagnetic properties were obtained simultaneously at room temperature. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) was carried out to investigate the chemical state of SBNF and Fe ion was found in mixed state. These results indicate that three-layered SrBi3Nb2FeO12 ceramics can be used as a kind of multiferroics in further research.