Effect of Ca incorporation on the dielectric nonlinear behavior of (Ba, Ca)TiO3 multi layer ceramic capacitors

The difference in the dielectric nonlinearity was investigated by contrasting BaTiO3 and (Ba0.925Ca0.075)TiO3 multilayer ceramic capacitors utilizing the first order reversal curve (FORC) distribution based on the Preisach model. Ca incorporation caused a decrease of the dielectric constants in the low field but little differences in the high field region resulting in a steep ac field dependence, which became more significant with the decrease of temperature. Such behavior can be correlated with a decrease of the reversible and an increase of the irreversible FORC distribution near origin by Ca incorporation. These results suggest that Ca incorporation, which is known to cause the asymmetric off-center displacement at Ba-site, has the role of weakly pinning centers that increase the portion of irreversible domain walls that are immobile at low field but can contribute to polarization beyond a threshold field.