Y. Li et al., Microstructural dependence of electrical conductivity of (ZrO2)(0.90)-(Y2O3)(0.04)-(CaO)(0.06) solid electrolyte, MAT SCI E B, 78(2-3), 2000, pp. 140-144
Mixed CaO/Y2O3-stabilized ZrO2 electrolytes were fabricated by different pr
ocessing procedures and the microstructural dependence of electrical conduc
tivity of the resultant samples was analyzed. It was found that, for the no
rmally sintered samples, the conductivity increases with increasing relativ
e density. Compared with the normally sintered samples, the microwave sinte
red sample possesses a much smaller grain structure, which results in a mor
e significant grain-boundary effect on and a slight decrease in the conduct
ivity. Since the mechanical properties of the electrolytes may be expected
to be enhanced by microwave sintering, it was suggested that microwave sint
ering might be an effective way to fabricate the electrolytes in the promis
ing system ZrO2-Y2O3-CaO. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserve
d.