New KNN-based lead-free piezoelectric ceramic for high-frequency ultrasound transducer applications

• DOI: 10.1007/s00339-015-9004-8
• Publication Date: 2015-01-29T07:47:12Z
• Authors: Jun Ou-Yang; Benpeng Zhu; Yue Zhang; Shi Chen; Xiaofei Yang; Wei Wei
• Keywords: 02 engineering and technology; 0210 nano-technology

Based on new KNN-based piezoelectric material 0.96(K0.48Na0.52)(Nb0.95Sb0.05)O3–0.04Bi0.5(Na0.82K0.18)0.5ZrO3 with a giant d33 of 490, a 37-MHz high-frequency ultrasound needle transducer with the aperture size of 1 mm was successfully fabricated. The obtained transducer had a high electromechanical coupling factor k t of 0.55, a good bandwidth of 56.8 % at −6 dB, and a low insertion loss of −16 dB at the central frequency. Its excellent performance is comparable to lead-containing transducer and is superior to that of any other lead-free transducer. This promising result demonstrates that this new KNN-based lead-free piezoelectric ceramic is a good candidate to replace lead-based materials for high-frequency ultrasound imaging.