Enhancement of pyroelectric properties of composite thick films using Mn-doped PZT

Abstract The effects of manganese (Mn) doping content in lead zirconate titanate (PZT) on PZT/polyvinylidene-trifluorethylene copolymer (P(VDF-TrFE)) composite thick films have been studied in this paper. Various Mn doped Pb(Zr 0.3 Ti 0.7 ) 1− x Mn x O 3 (PZTM x , x  = 0, 1, 2, 3 mol%) were mixed with P(VDF-TrFE) and coated on indium-tin-oxide (ITO)-coated glass substrates to fabricate the PZT/P(VDF-TrFE) composite films. The microstructures of PZTM x particles and the composite films have been investigated by scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction techniques. The dielectric and pyroelectric measurements were carried out to study the effects of Mn doping content on the electric properties of composites. It was found that the electric properties of composites show great dependence on Mn doping content in PZTM x ceramic filler. Especially, the pyroelectric coefficient and detectivity figure of merit ( F D ) of the PZTM 2 /P(VDF-TrFE) composite film reached 113 μC/m 2  K and 1.77 × 10 −5  Pa −1/2 , which increased about 26% and 35% than the pure PZT/P(VDF-TrFE) composite film, respectively.