Piezoelectric ceramics have now been used for over
30 years. They quickly replaced Rochelle salt as the
most widely used transducer material, and they have more recently challenged quartz in resonator and
electric wave filter applications. The discovery of the
reinanent piezoelectric effect in ferroelectric barium
titanate ceramic occurred in the later 1940's, 'a and
there has been considerable disagreement on responsibility for this discovery. At any rate this followed some years after discovery of the biased piezoelectric effect. Despite the analogous effects in ferromagnetism it was not recognized that the polarization would remain after removal of the electric field. This was perhaps because the high polarization involves large mechanical
distortion, abou 1% for barium titanate crystallites,
whereas in ferromagnetism the aligned spins cause displacements only of the order of tens of parts per million. Barium titanate, the first piezoelectric ceramic, was
used broadly after about 1947. Since about 1957 it has
been replaced in most applications by the lead titanate
zirconate compositionsa, which offer muchh igher
operating temperature, stronger piezoelectric effects, and a much larger variety of characteristics. The most
commonly used piezoelectric materials prior to 1947
were quartz, Rochelle salt, and ammonium dihydrogen
phosphate. Of these only quartz is still broadly used.
The ceramic materials can be formed into a wide
variety of shapes and sizes And the polar axis can be
directed according to this geometry.
The piezoelectric ceramics are ferroelectrics and
all ferroelectrics are piezoelectric and pyroelectric. The ferroelectrics are distinguished from other polar
piezoelectrics such as CdS in that the polar moments of
ferroelectrics can be redirected in certain discrete
directions governed by crystal symmetry by an external
electric field. Ferroelectrics also have a reference
nonpolar phase. The piezoelectric ceramics are piezoelectric
only by virtue of the ferroelectric distortion, and piezoelectricity disappears at the Curie point. Rochelle salt is ferroelectric between its Curie points,
but is piezoelectric also outside this range because the