Mechanical properties of textured, multilayered alumina produced using electrophoretic deposition in a strong magnetic field

The mechanical properties of ceramics materials can be tailored by designing their microstructures. It had generally been difficult to utilize a magnetic field for controlling the texture of diamagnetic ceramics because of their extremely small susceptibility; however, the possibility of controlling the texture by a magnetic field occurred with the development of superconducting magnets. We demonstrate in this study that alumina/alumina laminar composites with alternate crystalline-oriented layers are produced by electrophoretic deposition in a strong magnetic field and that the bending strength of the laminar composite depended on the direction of the multilayered microstructure.