Direct Fabrication of Yttrium Aluminium Garnet Nanofibers by Electrospinning

摘要

In this work, the technique of electrospinning has been employed to fabricate uniform one-dimensional(1-D) Yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG) nanofibers. YAG precursor was prepared by solel methodusing ethanol as solvent. Alcoholic solutions containing polyvinyl Alcohol (PVA) have been used as agel. The sol-gel was then introduced to the electrospinning apparatus to form nanofibers. Upon firingand sintering under carefully pre-selected timeemperature profiles, ceramic nanofibers retaining theoriginal morphological features observed in the as-spun composition are obtained. Calcination hasbeen done at different temperatures (800, 900, and 1000 ). Analytical tools, such as TGA and SEMhave been employed to elucidate the pathway of ceramic phase formation and the systematic evolutionof morphological features in the spun and the processed fibers. X-ray diffraction has also been used toidentify the crystalline state of the final products. Pure crystalline YAG phase was obtained at 800 鈼,without any intermediate phases such as YAlO3 (YAP) and Y4Al2O9 (YAM). The calcinationtemperature used in this study is significantly lower than that required by the conventional solid-statereaction process and comparable with that required by most of the chemical-based synthesis routes.