Morphological and structural properties of barium strontium titanate nanopowders synthesized via a sol-gel method

Abstract

Barium strontium titanate (Ba_1–xSr_xTiO₃, BSTO) powders were prepared using a sol-gel method. All of the samples were calcined at 800 °C. Effect of Sr concentration (x = 0, 0.3, 0.5, and 0.7) on morphological and structural properties of BSTO powders were investigated and discussed. Morphology of the BSTO powders revealed agglomerates of uniform irregular-shaped particles with sizes less than 100 nm. From X-ray analysis, all BSTO powders exhibited a cubic structure without any impurity or intermediate crystalline phases. The contraction of lattice constant and unit-cell volume of BSTO crystals was observed as the Sr concentration increased, confirming the incorporation of Sr into the Ba site. More detailed structural information of the BSTO powders was evaluated further through X-ray line profile analysis using the Williamson–Hall (W-H) plot. It was found that both the crystallite size and lattice strain of BSTO powders remained mostly unchanged with changing Sr concentration.

Keywords:

• Barium strontium titanate
• perovskite
• X-ray line profile analysis
• sol-gel method

Additional information

Funding

The authors gratefully thank financial supports from Kasetsart University Research and Development Institute (KURDI) and the Thailand Research Fund (MRG6180095).