Site-selectivity of 3d metal cation dopants and dielectric response in calcium copper titanate

By doping a few atomic percent of 3d-block cations, we demonstrate that the high dielectric response in CaCu3Ti4O12 can be reduced by a factor of similar to 10(3) at room temperature. Each of the added dopants shows its own preferential substitution on either Cu or Ti sites. The dopants that act as acceptors have a critical impact on the disappearance of the electrostatic potential barrier at grain boundaries, resulting in drastically decreased permittivity values of < 90 without voltage dependence. The present doping experiment directly shows that the potential barrier at internal interfaces is a key factor for the peculiar dielectric phenomena.(c) 2006 American Institute of Physics.