Electric fatigue in antiferroelectric Pb0.97La0.02(Zr0.55Sn0.33Ti0.12)O3 ceramics induced by bipolar cycling

Antiferroelectric lead zirconate titanate stannate (PZST) ceramics are promising materials for high-strain transducers and actuators. The degradation of the strain excited by an ac field remains largely unknown so far for this family of antiferroelectric ceramics. In this study, the bipolar electric fatigue of antiferroelectric Pb0.97La0.02(Zr0.55Sn0.33Ti0.12)O3 ceramics was investigated. Variations in the strain hysteresis loop and damage in the microstructure of the materials due to the electric cycling were monitored. Higher cycling field yielded a stronger fatigue effect. The material showed an increasingly asymmetric suppression of the strain hysteresis loop and diffuse AFE–FE phase transition with increasing cycle number. A damaged microstructure was observed on the polished surfaces of fatigued samples after acid etching. Electrochemical variations, the pinning of domains, randomly or preferentially orientated, due to the cycling are considered as the main fatigue mechanism of the material.