Lead-free (Ag,K)NbO 3 materials for high-performance explosive energy conversion

• DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aba0367
• Publication Date: 2020-05-20T23:16:40Z
• Authors: Zhen Liu; Teng Lu; Fei Xue; Hengchang Nie; Ray Withers; Andrew Studer; Felipe Kremer; Narendirakumar Na...; Xianlin Dong; Dehong Yu; Longqing Chen; Yun Liu; Genshui Wang
• Keywords: Natural bond orbital; Lead (geology)

Explosive energy conversion materials with extremely rapid response times have broad and growing applications in energy, medical, defense, mining areas. Research into the underlying mechanisms search for new candidate this field are so limited that environment-unfriendly Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 still dominates after half a century. Here, we report discovery of previously undiscovered, lead-free (Ag0.935K0.065)NbO3 material, which possesses record-high storage density 5.401 J/g, enabling pulse current ~ 22 A within 1.8 microseconds. It also exhibits excellent temperature stability up to 150°C. Various situ experimental theoretical investigations reveal mechanism explosive can be attributed pressure-induced octahedral tilt change from a-a-c+ a-a-c-/a-a-c+, accordance an irreversible pressure-driven ferroelectric-antiferroelectric phase transition. This work provides high performance alternative guidance further development devices conversion.