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Improper ferroelectrics as high‐efficiency energy conversion materials (Phys. Status Solidi RRL 5/2017)
Author(s) -
Wakamatsu Toru,
Tanabe Kenji,
Terasaki Ichiro,
Taniguchi Hiroki
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
physica status solidi (rrl) – rapid research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.786
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1862-6270
pISSN - 1862-6254
DOI - 10.1002/pssr.201770324
Subject(s) - pyroelectricity , materials science , ferroelectricity , figure of merit , dielectric , phase transition , ceramic , polarization (electrochemistry) , ferroelectric ceramics , perovskite (structure) , energy harvesting , permittivity , optoelectronics , energy transformation , energy (signal processing) , engineering physics , composite material , condensed matter physics , engineering , thermodynamics , physics , chemistry , quantum mechanics , chemical engineering
A pyroelectric material can produce electrical energy from a temporal variation of temperature that exists everywhere in our society. An excellent performance of pyroelectric energy conversion has been demonstrated in a stuffed aluminate zeolite (Ca 0.84 Sr 0.16 ) 8 [Al 12 O 24 ](MoO 4 ) 2 (CSAM‐16) in the study by Wakamatsu et al. (article no. 1700009 ). CSAM‐16 shows an improper ferroelectric phase transition at 440 K, giving rise to spontaneous polarization of 0.2 µC/cm 2 . Although a pyroelectric property of CSAM‐16 is not as large as conventional ferroelectrics, its small dielectric permittivity ( ε ' ∼ 10) even around the phase transition temperature, which is a unique feature of the improper ferroelectrics, boosts a figure‐of‐merit for the pyroelectric energy conversion to a value exceeding that for lead‐based ferroelectric ceramics such as PZT. The result of the present study provides a new route to designing efficient pyroelectric energy harvesters with improper ferroelectrics for a development of innovative stand‐alone micro‐energy harvesting devices.