Giant piezoelectricity of PNN-PIN-PT ceramics via domain engineering

The ferroelectric domain plays an important role in determining the piezoelectric performance of ferroelectric ceramics. Herein, LiNbO3 (LN) is used as an additive to tune the ferroelectric domain of 0.49Pb(Ni1/3Nb2/3)O3-0.2Pb(In1/2Nb1/2)O3-0.31PbTiO3 (PNN-PIN-PT) ceramics. PNN-PIN-PT-0LN ceramic exhibits the ordered tetragonal phase (90 °) domain wall and rhombohedral phase (71 ° and 109 °) domain wall. Incorporating LN into the system leads to the transformation of the majority of structured macro-domains into random micro-domains with smaller sizes, which disrupt their long-range ordered ferroelectric domains, resulting in significant piezoelectric enhancement. Compared to PNN-PIN-PT-0LN ceramics, PNN-PIN-PT-1.8LN ceramics exhibit giant piezoelectric responses with d33 = 1112 pC/N, d31 =521 pC/N, d33*=1220 pm/V (@ E = 5 kV/cm), εr = 12092. These findings shed light on a specific aspect of domain engineering in piezoelectric materials, thus contributing to a more comprehensive understanding of the underlying factors that give rise to the phenomenon of giant piezoelectricity.