Dielectric properties of BaTiO3-based ceramics sintered in reducing atmospheres prepared from nano-powders

In this paper, high purity BaTiO3 (BT) nano-powders with various grain sizes of 30-85 nm synthesized by chemical method were used to fabricate temperature-stable BT-based ceramic materials for application in base metal electrode (BME) multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCC). The effects of the initial grain sizes of BT nano-powders on the phase structures, microstructures and dielectric properties of the ceramics were investigated. The BT based MLCC ceramics with the average grain size less than 200 nm were achieved in reducing atmospheres, showing high dielectric constant up to 2000, low dielectric loss less than 1%, which could satisfy the X7R characteristics prescribed by EIA standard. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd and Techna Group S.r.l. All rights reserved.