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Abstract
Porous ceramics with type 3–3 connectivity were prepared and investigated with a view to their application for ultrasound transducers.
Ceramics with a porosity in the order of 0.4 to 0.5 exhibit sufficiently high permittivity (≈ 500), a thickness coupling factor equalling that of dense material (≈ 0.5), a low transverse coupling factor, a low vibrational Q (≈ 20) and low acoustic impedance (≈ 9·106kg/m2·s), all of which indicates their eminent suitability as a material for the fabrication of transducers as used in medical diagnostics.
The experimentally determined influence of the porosity on the dielectric constants of these materials was used for the critical testing of various theories for calculating the constants of multiphase materials. It was found that the dielectric and elastic constants of porous piezoelectric ceramics can be very satisfactorily described on the basis of Bruggeman's theory, which has fallen somewhat into obscurity. Their piezoelectric properties are discussed with reference to an effective medium approximation and a cell model.
