Grain Growth Control of Dielectric and Magnetic Ceramics

The sintering process transported the atoms in the materials by decreasing the total interface energy. The microstructure changes as a result of grain growth and densification under the capillary driving force due to the interface curvature among grains. The grain growth rate is expressed as the product of the interface mobility and the driving force. According to grain growth theories, the mobility of the interface governed by diffusion control is constant but interface mobility is nonlinear when the movement of an interface is governed by interface reaction. As the growth rate is nonlinear for the regime of interface reaction control, the grain growth is nonstationary with annealing time. The microstructure can be controlled by changing the growth rate of an individual grain with the correlation between the maximum driving force and the critical driving force for appreciable growth. The present paper discusses applications of the principle in the fabrication of dielectric and magnetic ceramic materials.