Ionic conductivity studies on Sr stabilized zirconia by impedance spectroscopy

Sr stabilized zirconia has been prepared by the co-precipitation method and electrically characterized by using impedance spectroscopy in the frequency range from 42 Hz to 5 MHz. The charge carrier concentration of the material has been calculated from the conductance spectra and it is found to be of the order of 10²⁵ cm⁻³. The conductance spectra show a dc plateau and a dispersive region suggesting correlated hopping motion of the ions. The impedance analysis shows a depressed semicircle indicating non-Debye nature of the material as well as the broad nature of modulus peaks indicates non-Debye behaviour. The bulk resistance of the material has been extracted from the impedance spectra and it is found to be 3.5×10⁷ Ω·cm⁻¹ at 673 K. The low frequency dispersion of the dielectric constant implies the space charge effects arising from the electrodes. Paper presented at the 2nd International Conference on Ionic Devices, Anna University, Chennai, India, Nov. 28 – 30, 2003.