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Recently, NaNbO3-based ceramics with excellent energy storage performances (ESPs) and fast charge-discharge characteristics have attracted great attention. In this case, BaTiO3 modified 0.85NaNbO3-0.15Bi(Zn2/3Nb1/3)O3 (0.85NN-0.15BZN-yBT) ceramics were designed and successfully fabricated using solid state synthesis. The discharge storage density of the ceramics increases from 1.22 J/cm3 at y = 0–1.84 J/cm3 at y = 8%, which is 1.5 times higher than pure 0.85NN-0.15BZN ceramics. This ceramic reveals excellent temperature stability up to 150 °C, good discharge cycling after 105 cycles and high discharge speed of 2.0 μs, broadening the scope of NaNbO3-based ceramics for energy storage applications.

Nb-containing antiferroelectric materials have recently attracted great research interest as energy storage materials for pulsed power capacitors due to their extraordinary energy storage performances. In this case, the optimization of the energy storage performance is obtained by a compositional modulation of NaNbO3-Bi(Zn2/3Nb1/3)O3 bulk ceramics. An optimal energy performance can be obtained with a composition of 0.85NaNbO3-0.15Bi(Zn2/3Nb1/3)O3, which is accompanied by a stable charge energy density in temperatures up to 150 °C owing to its relaxor characteristics and excellent cycling stability after 105 cycles. This work further broadens the scope of NaNbO3-based ceramic applications in the area of pulsed power sources.

Compositional design by multiphase coexistence is regarded as a guiding rule for material design to develop high-performance piezoelectric materials. An open question is whether a certain PZT composition outside of the morphotropic phase boundary (MPB) region can obtain high piezoelectric response like that close to MPB region. Here, a non-MPB composition, rhombohedral Pb(Zr0.54Ti0.46)O3 was selected as the parent material. The optimized electrical properties were obtained by Sm doping with a large piezoelectric coefficient d33 of 590 pC/N, a high planar electromechanical coupling factors kp of 57.1%, a large piezoelectric strain S of 0.31% (d33∗ = 632 pm/V), and a promising Curie temperature of 335 °C, compared to the commercial PZTs. The enhancement of piezoelectric response can be ascribed to the donor characteristics by Sm replacement, which contribute to polarization orientation of ferroelectric dipoles. This work broadens the domain of high-performance piezoelectrics by developing novel solid solutions beyond the MPB framework.