Structure correlated ferroelectricity and other properties of perovskite PbTio3-based ceramics

Abstract

Throughout history, technology has widely facilitated human development. Each technological innovation has marked an approach to change in human behavior and physical capabilities, which in turn, has allowed for further technological innovations. Materials technology too has exercised an intense impact on the evolution of human civilization. Historians have defined the various time periods in the human history distinctly as the Stone Age, Bronze Age, the Iron Age and Silicon or the Synthetic materials Age. Each era followed by another has been brought about by the invention of even better products. The beginning of the 21st century has already witnessed the emergence of the ‘Smart Materials Age’. It has been categorized by a technological revolution that will exploit several emerging technologies such as materials science, biotechnology, biomimetic, nanotechnology, molecular electronics, and artificial intelligence. By developing state-of-the-art technologies in diverse fields of sciences, today’s engineers, chemists, physicists and materials scientists are devising innovative inter-disciplinary techniques for synthesizing, analyzing, and manufacturing new generations of engineered materials. Smart materials systems are non-living systems that incorporate theutilities of actuation, sensing, logic, and monitor to respond adaptively to changes in their environment to which they are exposed, in a useful and usually repetitive manner. The smart materials are part of the smart system-functional materials for a variety of engineering applications. They possess both sensing and actuating functions. Many existing engineering materials can be engaged as sensor and actuator materials if they can be correctly designed. They include piezoelectric ceramics and polymers, shape memory alloys, optical fibers and conductive, etc.