Microstructural analyses and improved ionic conductivity of La0.62Li0.16TiO3 ceramics prepared by a reactive-templated grain growth (RTGG) process

Impedance measurements were conducted for textured lithium lanthanum titanate (LLTO) ceramics prepared by the reactive-templated grain growth (RTGG) process. Four La0.62Li0.16TiO3 cuboid ceramics with different degree of <110> crystal orientation were used for the measurement at temperatures from 298 to 423 K. The ionic conductivity of the specimen processed with 20% of the reactive template was one order of magnitude higher than that without a template. The high conductivity was attributed to the decrease of grain boundaries caused by the templated grain growth. No obvious anisotropic conductivity was detected for the specimens by the influence of grain and domain boundaries. Domain structures in the LLTO grains were observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) for all specimens.