Growth of BaTiO3 seed grains by the twin-plane reentrant edge mechanism

Two different types of BaTiO3 seed particles, normal and twinned seeds of s imilar to 30 mu m on the average, were prepared from crushed sintered speci mens. Normal seeds were obtained from the usual BaTiO2 sintered compacts, w hile twinned seeds containing a double twin were obtained from BaTiO2 compa cts sintered with 2 mol% of SiO2. The BaTiO3 powder compacts were again pre pared with 5 wt% of seed grains anti sintered under various conditions. The microstructural evolution was quite different in the two cases: the growth of normal seed grains was ultimately limited but that of the twinned seeds continued extensively. The observed difference is discussed in terms of th e growth mechanism and the atomic structure of interfaces.