CBSE BOARD PROJECT

PIEZOELECTRIC CRYSTALS
Research and Preparation

ISHPREET SINGH, XII-B

 DELHI PRIVATE SCHOOL, DUBAI

CERTIFICATE
Certified that this project file is the bonafide
work of Master/Miss ………………………………………………
Class …………………… Roll no. ………………………………
recorded in the school laboratory during the
academic year 2019 to 2020.

……………………………… ………………………………

External Examiner Teacher-in-Charge

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I have taken efforts in this project. However, it would not have

been possible without the kind support and help of many
individuals and my school. I would like to extend my sincere
thanks to all of them.

I am highly indebted to Mrs. Roopa Shankar for her guidance,

constant supervision and for providing necessary information
regarding the project. I’m also grateful for her support in
completing the project on the topic “PIEZOELECTRICITY”.
This research project helped me in gaining many new insights
on topics related to the chemistry behind piezoelectric crystals.

I would like to express my gratitude towards my Principal

Ms. Rashmi Nandkeolyar for her kind co-operation and
encouragement which helped me in completion of this project.

I would like to express my special gratitude and thanks to my

parents and friends who helped me in finalizing this project
within a limited time frame.
INDEX
I. AIM
II. HYPOTHESIS
III. THEORY
IV. PROCEDURES
V. OBSERVATION
VI. APPLICATIONS
VII. BIBLIOGRAPHY
AIM

To investigate about the phenomenon of

piezoelectricity, and create piezoelectric
crystals in the lab to produce electricity.

HYPOTHESIS
Piezoelectricity is an interesting property of a solid material to produce
electricity upon the application of mechanical stress. Does a mere crystal
produce electricity? What is the significance of this phenomenon on the
molecular level? What are the applications of this in real life? What is the
history behind the discovery of this effect?
This project aims to produce piezoelectricity in a laboratory, and also to answer
several questions.

THEORY
Piezoelectricity is the electric charge that accumulates in certain solid materials (such as crystals,
certain ceramics, and biological matter such as bone, DNA and various proteins) in response to
applied mechanical stress.
The word piezoelectricity means electricity resulting from pressure and latent heat. It is derived from
the Greek word piezein, which means to squeeze or press, and electron, which means amber, an ancient
source of electric charge. 
The first demonstration of the direct piezoelectric effect was in 1880 by the brothers Pierre
Curie and Jacques Curie.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piezoelectricity They combined their knowledge
of pyroelectricity with their understanding of the underlying crystal structures that gave rise to
pyroelectricity to predict crystal behavior, and demonstrated the effect using crystals
of tourmaline, quartz, topaz, cane sugar, and Rochelle salt (sodium potassium tartrate tetrahydrate).
Quartz and Rochelle salt exhibited the most piezoelectricity.
For the next few decades, piezoelectricity remained something of a laboratory curiosity, though it was a
vital tool in the discovery of polonium and radium by Pierre and Marie Curie in 1898. The first
practical application for piezoelectric devices was sonar, first developed during World War I.
The piezoelectric effect exists in two domains.
a) Direct piezoelectric effect: Converts
mechanical stress to emf
b) Reverse piezoelectric effect: Converts
electrical energy to mechanical compression or
expansion
These two effects are described in the given figure.
The inverse piezoelectric effect is very useful because it is implemented in many transducers to
produce ultrasonic sound waves.
The polarity of emf generated across the surfaces of a
piezoelectric material depends upon the type of force it
is subjected to; i.e. compressive (positive emf) or
tensile (negative emf). The following figures explain in
detail about it.
To understand how a piezoelectric material produces
electricity, let’s look at a non-piezoelectric material: the
overall charge center of positive and negative ions in the unit
cell coincide, and even with applied deformation, these
cancel out, and no overall polarisation appears.
Note that even if we consider elongation in the horizontal direction due to the compression, the charges
still cancel out.
In crystalline piezoelectric materials, the unique distribution of charges gives rise to a dipole moment
when the material is deformed.
Consider the example 2D lattice
as shown below. A unit cell is
shown outlined with dashed lines.
Without any external stress, the
centroid of positive and negative
charges coincides and marked by
a black dot.

When the material is compressed

(right figure), the distance between the atoms remains the same, which is only possible by expanding
the material horizontally. This in turn moves the positive and negative charges denoted by a star (*)
apart, and their centroid no longer coincide, but are shown by blue and red dots, creating an electric
dipole.
So, when the material is in a free state (without any
pressure), those molecules will be arranged in a certain way
which corresponds to an equilibrium of the mater and in
which the charges of the molecules cancels itself if we look
at the whole. When a pressure is applied however, those
molecules change position and align into a dipolar state in
which the global charge isn’t null anymore and two sides of the
materials become polarized.
But why is charge changing for piezoelectric materials and not for any other material?
It is because of the special arrangement of the piezoelectric material crystals in a hexagonal
configuration.

If you look at the atoms that compose a piezoelectric material crystal for example, you will notice that
they are arranged like this:

CENTRE OF
CHARGE
When the crystal is compressed, the 2 positive charges on the top move horizontally and not vertically,
which causes the center of positive charge to change position upward.

Same for the negative charges.

The average of the 3 negative charges moves downward.

In an uncompressed crystal, the positive charges and

negative charges just cancel each other and the resultant
charge is null.
When you compress the crystal in a certain orientation,
you are slightly shifting the average position of the
positive charges in one direction and the average of the
negative charges in the other direction.
This create an accumulation of positive charges on one
face and an accumulation of negative charges on the other
face.
If you then wire up those faces, the positively charges face
will start to pull electrons negatively charged towards it
through the wire and the negatively charged face will
repel electrons.

To simplify, in a piezoelectric crystal, the atoms have a dipole along their bonds due to separation of
charges (for example, between Si2+ ion and an O2- ion
in a quartz crystal). When the crystal is compressed,
the atoms shift such that their dipoles do not cancel each
other out anymore. This causes the unit cell to have a
net positive charge on one side and a net negative charge on the other. This charge imbalance is
repeated across the material. Thus, opposite charges accumulate on opposite sides of the material,
resulting in a resultant voltage.
 THE EXPERIMENT
AIM: 
To prepare piezoelectric crystals of Rochelle salt.
MATERIALS REQUIRED:
 600 ml beaker
 250 ml beaker
 Lab burner 
 Glass stir rod
 Funnel
 Filter paper 
 2 spatulas
 Potassium bitartrate (also known as cream of tartar)
 Sodium carbonate (also known as washing soda)
 Thermometer
 Digital Multimeter
 Saucepan
 
PRECAUTIONS:
1. Carefully stop heating the solution as soon as it becomes colourless.
2. Filter the solution to avoid the presence of any impurities.
3. Keep the clear solution in a mildly cold place, and not in a freezer, since crystals do
not form at this temperature.
4. Select the clearest and purest crystals for testing.
5. Make sure that all settings of the multimeter are correct.

PROCEDURE:
 1. In a saucepan, take about 100g of cream of tartar in 1 cup of water, and mix it well.
Heat the mixture till it starts to simmer.
2. Stir it well so that the particulate is in suspension and not settled on the bottom of
the saucepan.
3. Heat just until the temperature maintains 180 F (82 C), stirring constantly.
4. As soon as the solution starts to bubble, add a half teaspoon of sodium carbonate to
the measuring cup. This will fizz and bubble up. As the fizzing begins to settle, stir
the solution well.
5. Repeat the process of adding a half teaspoon of Sodium Carbonate and stirring the
solution until the solution no longer fizzes and becomes clear. This is when it
attains its saturation point.
6. Remove the beaker from heat and turn off the burner.
7. While the solution is still hot, pour it through a filter paper lined funnel to remove
any undissolved Sodium Carbonate particulate from the solution.
8. If the solution begins to cool and crystals form and clog the filter paper, simply
reheat the solution and pour again.
9.  Place it in a cool place. Overnight, crystalline Rochelle salt (potassium sodium
tartrate) will have begun to form. Store the solution for a few days.
10. Pour off the remaining solution into another container. Dry off each crystal to
prepare them for selection. 
11. Select all crystals that that are smooth on their sides and rectangular in shape. Of
these, pick the clearest crystal for testing. 

The reaction taking place is an acid-base neutralization reaction, to form Rochelle Salt,
(2)KC4H5O6 + Na2CO3  ⟶ (2)KNaC4H4O6 + CO2 + H2O
(2 cream of tartar + washing soda   ⟶ 2 Rochelle salt + carbon dioxide + water)

Testing the piezoelectricity of the crystal…

Take a clear crystal and place the two electrodes of a digital multimeter on it. Now, gently
tap the multimeter with any object. A deflection should be visible, showing that an AC
voltage is produced.
 Advantages of piezoelectricity-
1. No external power source required: Thanks to their ability to produce a voltage when
acted upon by a force, piezo materials require no external power source.
2. Easy installation: With small dimensions, they’re a great fit and easily installed in high-
density electronic devices.
3. Responsiveness to high-frequencies: Compared to other devices, piezo materials have a
substantially higher frequency response — which makes them wonderfully responsive in
even the most demanding situations.
4. Highly flexible materials: Most piezo materials can be constructed in a wide variety of
shapes and sizes, so they’re highly useful across various applications and fields.

Disadvantages of piezoelectricity-
1. Small amount of electric charge: Though they’re self-generating, piezo materials
produce fairly small electric charges, which means a high impedance cable is required to
connect them to an electrical interface.
2. Environmental conditions affect performance: Piezo materials are affected by
temperature and changes in humidity. Plus, while in the static condition, they can’t
measure output.
3. Output is relatively low: While some piezo materials produce more output than others,
they’re all relatively low. For their use to be optimized, an external circuit will often be
required.
REAL LIFE
APPLICATIONS
Currently, industrial and manufacturing is the largest application market for piezoelectric devices,
followed by the automotive industry. Strong demand also comes from medical instruments as well as
information and telecommunications. The global demand for piezoelectric devices was valued at
approximately US$14.8 billion in 2010. The largest material group for piezoelectric devices is
piezoceramics, and piezopolymer is experiencing the fastest growth due to its low weight and small
size.
1. The best-known application is the electric cigarette lighter: pressing the button causes a
spring-loaded hammer to hit a piezoelectric crystal, producing a sufficiently high-
voltage electric current that flows across a small spark gap, thus heating and igniting the gas.
2. Quartz watches use a quartz crystal that oscillates at a precise frequency: exactly 32768 times
each second.
3. A piezoelectric transformer is a type of AC voltage multiplier, it uses acoustic coupling
instead of magnetic coupling between input and output.
4. Infertility treatment: In people with previous total fertilization failure, piezoelectric activation
of oocytes together with intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) seems to improve fertilization
outcomes.
5. Surgery: A recent application of piezoelectric ultrasound sources is piezoelectric
surgery. Piezosurgery is a minimally invasive technique that aims to cut a target tissue with
little damage to neighboring tissues. For example, Hoigne et
al,https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piezoelectricity reported its use in hand surgery for the cutting
of bone.
6. Piezoelectric motors: Piezoelectric elements apply a directional force to an axle, causing it to
rotate. Due to the extremely small distances involved, the piezo motor is viewed as a high-
precision replacement for the stepper motor.
7. Piezoelectric sensor: The principle of operation of a piezoelectric sensor is that a physical
dimension, transformed into a force, acts on two opposing faces of the sensing element.
Depending on the design of a sensor, different "modes" to load the piezoelectric element can be
used: longitudinal, transversal and shear.
8. Inkjet printers: On many inkjet printers, piezoelectric crystals are used to drive the ejection of
ink from the inkjet print head towards the paper.
CONCLUSIONS
When the piezoelectric crystal was placed under mechanical stress by striking it
with a marker, an electric current was generated. Thus, our experiment was
successful.
Piezoelectricity is not a new concept in engineering but it is a revolutionary
concept in the field of sensors and transducers. Now, we can find the use of
piezoelectricity not only in every individual house but in many industries, like
aeronautics and automobiles. There are also some concepts under development
such as piezoelectric accelerometer, motor, underwater acoustic transducers,
piezoelectric transformers etc. As piezoelectricity is a simple concept and
materials are the easy to produce, Indian industries should take a step towards it.
This is not only related to electrical and electronics but also very much related
to mechanical engineering. Mechanical strain gauges, micro scale displacement
sensors, small valve switches, sensitive balance are possible only due to
piezoelectricity. There are some lead free piezoelectric materials which can
replace those materials having lead, making the equipment eco-friendly.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Øwww.wikipedia.org
Øwww.icbse.com
Øwww.ncert.nic.in
Øimages.google.com

ØHarper, Douglas. "piezoelectric". Online Etymology Dictionary.

ØCurie, Jacques; Curie, Pierre (1880). "Développement par

compression de l'électricité polaire dans les cristaux hémièdres à faces
inclinées" [Development, via compression, of electric polarization in
hemihedral crystals with inclined faces]. Bulletin de la Société
Minérologique de France.