Controlled Flux Growth of Complex Oxide Single Crystals

Crystallization from fluxes was developed in general to grow complex oxide single crystals [1, 2, 3, 4]. Many synthetic single crystals of ferroelectrics, ferrites, laser materials [1, 2, 3], and, starting in 1987, the rediscovered high-temperature superconductors [5] are prepared by crystallization from fluxes. Spontaneous crystallization is the most widely used method at present. This is due to its use as the first step in searching for new crystals of complex multicomponent systems, incongruently-melting compounds, and high-melting materials as well as its technical simplicity [4].