Low temperature sintering of doped PMN-PT based dielectrics for multilayer capacitors

95Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O-3-5PbTiO(3) (95PMN-5PT) was doped with transition metal oxides such as CuO, ZnO, and NiO in order to improve the sinterability and dielectric properties for multilayer capacitors. With the addition of dopants more than 1 mole %, the sintering temperature of doped ceramics decreased to 850 degrees C with >95%TD, which enables to apply 100% Ag or Cu internal electrode. Moreover, the sintered body consisted of pyrochlore-free cubic perovskite phase at such a low temperature ensuring high dielectric constants. The dielectric constant maximum temperatures, T-epsilon max, decreased with CuO and NiO additions while increased with ZnO addition. The maximum dielectric constants, loss tangents, and specific resistivities with optimum processing conditions were >20,000, <5%, and >10(11) Omega . cm, respectively.