Sintering characteristics, phase structure and microwave dielectric properties of novel BaCeO3 ceramics

It is a known fact that BaCeO3 (BC) is a material widely used in catalysts and electrochemistry, but its microwave dielectric performances have not been explored. Herein, novel BC microwave dielectric ceramics are prepared by the solid-state reaction method. The single-phase BC ceramic with orthorhombic structure (Pnma space group) is confirmed via Rietveld refinements and synthesized. Raman analysis reveals that the Q × f value of ceramics is negatively correlated with the full width at half maximum of the Raman peak. High surface densification and uniform grain size are obtained at 1650 °C and exhibit decent microwave dielectric properties: εr = 14.68, Q × f = 27037 GHz(at 9.32 GHz), and τf = -63.67 ppm/°C. The XPS results show that the oxygen vacancy content is the lowest and the Q × f value is the largest at the sintering temperature of 1650°C. The results indicate that the ceramic is a good candidate for microwave dielectric materials.