Study and characterization of the BNO (BiNbO₄) ceramic added with 3 wt. % CuO

The objective of this work is to synthesize and characterize the BNO (BiNbO₄) ceramic added with 3 wt. % CuO to improvements in densification. The BNO was prepared by conventional ceramic method. The powders milled for 2 h were calcined at 850 °C for 3 h. After calcination the powders we re characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD). The detailed characterization of XRD was performed using the program DBWS9807a which uses the Rietveld method for refinement of crystal structures. The refinement confirmed the acquisition of isolated α-BNO phase with orthorhombic crystal structure (a = 5.6792Å, and b = 11.7081Å c = 4.9823Å; α = β = γ = 90) and density of the unit cell calculated 6.61g/cm3. Micrographs, to analyze densification behavior and grain size were obtained using a Scanning Electron Microscope model TESCAN manufactured by Bruker AXS detector. (author)