Low temperature calcination induced flexibility in purely inorganic lead zirconate titanate and its application in piezoelectric enhanced adsorption.

• Preparation of pure inorganic piezoelectric nanofiber membrane at low temperature. • By lowering the temperature, the pure inorganic piezoelectric fiber membrane shows good flexibility. • It is found that ultrasonic vibration can accelerate the adsorption behavior of fiber membrane. • Through the color change after PZT saturated adsorption, the actual concentration of the dye can be quickly determined. It is a challenge to achieve flexibility in purely inorganic piezoelectric materials without organic support, and various thin film flexible inorganic piezoelectric materials has been developed recently. In this work, lead zirconate titanate (PZT) nanofiber membranes were prepared by electrospinning, and a flexible membranes can be obtained by reducing the calcination temperature, and the flexibility was characterized by the three-point method. The fiber membrane was relatively thicker in relative to thin films and confirmed to adsorb Congo Red quickly under the action of ultrasound. The maximum adsorption capacity is 61.78 mg g−1 and saturation time reaches 20 min under ultrasound treatment. In addition, the color change after saturation adsorption can quickly determine the actual load of the fiber membrane. In the future, this load saturation effect can be used to calibrate the relationship between the piezoelectric signal and the adsorption load, so as to obtain more accurate chemical sensors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]