Electrical Degradation Induced Formations of Current Transients in Lead Zirconate Titanate

Nowadays, the piezoelectric materials are widely used in many areas. The piezoelectric materials will undergo an electrical degradation process during working causes the piezoelectricity and resistance of the piezoelectric materials degrade. The existence of the electrical degradation phenomenon severely limits the applications of the piezoelectric products. During the electrical degradation process, electrical breakdown often occurs and this electrical breakdown has been proposed [1, 2] induces the resistance decrease and local phase changing. In this paper, the electrical breakdown induced current transients are detailed investigated. Three types of current transients are presented and the time durations of current transients are suggested not constant and corresponding to the time duration of the local burn-out process, which is caused by the heat released from the electrical breakdown process.