<title>Fabrication of high-performance PZT actuator using microwave sintering process</title>

Recently, high-performance piezoelectric actuators with larger force and displacement output are being studied by many researchers due to their prospective application in smart material and structural systems, especially for vibration and noise control. The improvement of performance is achieved by the improvement on material composite, sintering process, and actuator structures. On the other hand, studies have also been carried out on the application of microwave sintering process in the sintering of structural ceramic materials. In this study, the application of. 28GHz microwave sintering process in the sintering of PZT materials was tried and sintering conditions were intensively investigated. Microwave sintering offers advantages over conventional technologies, such as repression of grain growth due to rapid heating, and improvement of microstructure due to internal heating. As a result, the sintering time of PZT materials using 28GHz microwave was reduced to 1/10 of the time needed for the conventional sintering process, with improvements on the properties such as electromechanical coupling factor, and piezoelectric constants. Furthermore the performances of the actuators fabricated with the microwave sintering process were evaluated in a vibration test and compared with the performances of the actuator fabricated with the traditional sintering process, and the performance superiority was confirmed.