A Brief Insight on the Aspects of Barium Titanate as Electronic Material

Barium titanate is a perovskite based electroceramic material having Curie temperature at around 120°C while the structure of this complex oxide is noted to be varying with crystallite size as prepared by various techniques. Barium titanate is one of the most promising candidates after replacement of lead based zirconate, niobates in the field of electroceramics for ferroelectric, piezoelectric applications. It possesses high dielectric constant, low loss characteristics leading to its viability for multilayer capacitor, capacitor and energy storage devices. Nanocrystalline form is found to have versatile application as piezoelectric sensors, transducers, sonar, actuator, thin film devices, high density optical storage, lasers, phase conjugated mirrors, on-chip programmable devices, nonlinear optics, catalyst, non-volatile memory and others. Donor doped barium titanate is also applicable as thermistors for its PTCR properties. Barium titanate crystals are also noted to be applicable for promising biomedical devices, bone cement formation, piezoelectric dopant for smart prosthetic implants. Domain structure is formed in the material during its transition from cubic to tetragonal at Curie temperature. Domain type, configuration is observed to be influenced by presence of additives, microstructure during the sintering process affecting the ferroelectric properties. The material is found to be synthesized by various methods like solid-state reaction, mechanochemical activation, sol-gel process, hydrothermal, co-precipitation, polymer precursor methods, low temperature biological process, chemical precursor route and others. Various physical properties in the context of concerned corresponding characterizations are discussed in the present article.