Correlation among oxygen vacancies in bismuth titanate ferroelectric ceramics

Pure Bi4Ti3O12 ceramics were prepared using the conventional solid-state reaction method and their dielectric properties were investigated. A dielectric loss peak with the relaxation-type characteristic was observed at about 370 K at 100 Hz frequency. This peak was confirmed to be associated with the migration of oxygen vacancies inside ceramics. The Cole-Cole fitting to this peak reveals a strong correlation among oxygen vacancies and this strong correlation is considered to commonly exist among oxygen vacancies in ferroelectrics. Therefore, the migration of oxygen vacancies in ferroelectric materials would demonstrate a collective behavior instead of an individual one due to this strong correlation. Furthermore, this correlation is in proportion to the concentration and in inverse proportion to the activation energy of oxygen vacancies. These results could be helpful to the understanding of the fatigue mechanisms in ferroelectric materials. (C) 2004 American Institute of Physics.