Papers by Keyword: Piezo-Spectroscopy

Abstract: In the area of dental treatment for crown and dental implants, ceramics restoration is becoming popular due to both aesthetic needs and release of metallic allergy. However, for the restoration of defected tooth, ceramics materials with higher reliability than that of conventional glass or alumina have been required, thus raising expectations for zirconia ceramics. Since residual stress play a significant role in the reliability of dental implants, in this paper, a non-destructive assessment of residual stress is presented for a zirconia-substrate/VINTAGE ZR T-Glass system using confocal fluorescence microprobe spectroscopy.

Abstract: Alumina matrix composite (AMC) has been widely used for artificial hip and knee joints because of its phase stability in human body and its excellent wear resistance. The excellent mechanical properties of strength and fracture toughness of zirconia materials are well known to be closely related to stress-induced transformation from the tetragonal to the monoclinic phase, which is accompanied with 4% volume increase of the zirconia crystal cell. However, it is also to be considered that the material is prone to low temperature aging degradation (LTAD) under hydrothermal environment, like in the human body. This LTAD is influenced by the tetragonal to the monoclinic (t-m) phase transformation. T-m transformation also induces the formation of microcracks at the material surface, and an increase in surface. Microcracking leads to a decrease of mechanical properties, and could explain the failure of implants after some years in vivo [1, 2] .Therefore, it is very important to study how to prevent phase transformation in zirconia components. Transformed monoclinic zirconia percentage can be experimentally measured by Raman spectroscopy and the residual stress distribution, which is related to phase transformation, can be determined by a non-destructive piezo-spectroscopic analysis. In this paper, we attempted to evaluate it from both stress and mechanical properties points of view by confocal Raman and fluorescence spectroscopy.

Abstract: To improve mechanical properties of mullite, a mullite-Al2O3\mullite laminate composite was prepared. Lamination generates residual stresses within the structure, measured by piezospectroscopy. A preliminary and complete piezo-spectroscopic characterization of the Al2O3\mullite system was carried out. A method to determine the concentration of Al2O3 in the composite by Raman spectrum was proposed and used to assess the composition of the laminated structure along the cross section. The experimental results evidenced a gradual change of composition and residual stress state between the two layer.

Abstract: The piezo-spectroscopic (PS) effect, which may be defined as the shift in wavelength of a spectroscopic transition in a solid in response to an applied strain or stress, may occur both in crystalline and in amorphous structures, regardless of the particular spectroscopic transition involved (e.g., luminescence or Raman spectrum), and independent of the specific mechanism of luminescence emission (i.e., including spectra generated from substitutional impurities, optically active point defects, etc.). The PS effect can be monitored on electro-stimulated spectra when the scale on which the needed characterization lie is of a nanometer length. This effect, being a physical property of the studied material, should be calibrated case by case. The high scanning speed (and computer control) of the electron beam, which can be easily obtained with scan coils, is unsurpassed. Since the most recently developed optoelectronic devices have active areas of submicron dimensions and many of them less than 100 nm, no obvious choice is left but urgently developing an electro-stimulated probe for nano-scale residual stress assessments. In this paper, we show the feasibility of nano-scale stress assessments in the neighborhood of the tip of a crack propagating in GaN, selected as a paradigm semiconductor material.

Abstract: The electro-stimulated luminescence spectrum of a rare-earth ion added to zirconia (ZrO2) lattice was investigated with the aim of using it as a sensor for nano-scale stress (fluorescence piezo-spectroscopy) and phase transformation assessments in a field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM). In this paper, the selected rare-earth fluorescent ion Eu, added to ZrO2 as a raw oxide powder (Eu2O3) before sintering (in the amount of 1.0 wt. %). Spectroscopic results indicated that the spectral shift of some fluorescent band of the selected rare-earth ion was sensitive to residual stress and that the electron-stimulated spectra of Eu2O3-doped ZrO2 in its tetragonal and monoclinic polymorphs were different to each other. Based on these findings, the luminescent substance can be useful as a “stress and phase transformation sensor”, in order to clarify the elementary mechanisms behind synthetic ZrO2.

Abstract: Residual stresses in Ni-MLCC were investigated by Raman microprobe piezo-spectroscopic (PS) methods. The shape of the Raman spectrum of BaTiO3 in Ni-MLCC depended on the angle between the polarizing direction of the incident laser beam and the direction of the internal electrode. From a set of precise calibrations, we show that the orientation dependence arises from the interaction between internal stresses and the polycrystalline microstructure; by taking into account such an orientation dependence, we were able to establish a technique for the measurement of the distribution of residual stresses in Ni-MLCC.

Abstract: In order to understand the mechanical behavior of layered composites with compositional gradient, it is necessary to determine their state of residual stresses. Compositionally graded materials can offer the advantage of eliminating abrupt changes in composition between layers having different thermal expansion coefficients. The existence of a compositional gradient may reduce discontinuities in thermal residual stresses, something beneficial from the point of view of the mechanical properties. We present here a study of the state of the residual stresses in a layered material made of thicker (several mm) homogeneous layers of alumina and alumina-20%zirconia separated by a thinner (less than 300 µm) intermediate graded alumina-zirconia layer, obtained by controlled deposition of powders from a solution using an electrophoretic deposition method. The thermal residual stresses generated during cooling after sintering were measured in the homogeneous layers at each side, and at steps of about 30 µm in the graded layer along the direction of the compositional gradient, by using fluorescence ruby luminescence piezo-spectroscopy. Results show that the hydrostatic stresses on alumina grains vary continuously, indicating the absence of discontinuities in thermal residual stresses along the compositionally graded layer and at the interfaces of the homogeneous layers.

Abstract: Many of the properties of Si-based ceramics, including their structural behavior, are strongly influenced by their micro/nanostructure and by the microscopic residual stress fields piled up during processing and/or usage. The electron beam, used as a sharp and reliable probe for high-resolution cathodoluminescence (CL) assessments, can routinely provide a suitable tool for assessing both the structural and the mechanical characteristics of Si-based ceramics on a sub-micrometer scale. Although the full development of stress-related CL techniques is still in embryo, we show here the possibility of assessing microscopic stress fields inside a field-emission gun scanning electron microscope (FEG-SEM). This new assessment takes advantage of the piezo-spectroscopic effect on selected bands of CL spectra and it is applied here to both β-silicon nitride (Si3N4) and β-silicon carbide (SiC) ceramics. CL spectra in both materials arise from their peculiar optically active defects. Experimental assessments of microstress fields may open a completely new perspective in the development of high-performance Si-based ceramics because one can directly visualize how residual stresses distribute within the material micro/nanostructure and miniaturized devices.