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Nature Materials volume 14, pages 500–504 (2015 )Cite this article Fev
Bismuth-oxide-based materials are the building blocks for modern ferroelectrics1, multiferroics2, gas sensors3, light photocatalysts4 and fuel cells5,6. Although the cubic fluorite δ-phase of bismuth oxide (δ-Bi2O3) exhibits the highest conductivity of known solid-state oxygen ion conductors5, its instability prevents use at low temperature7,8,9,10. Here we demonstrate the possibility of stabilizing δ-Bi2O3 using highly coherent interfaces of alternating layers of Er2O3-stabilized δ-Bi2O3 and Gd2O3-doped CeO2. Remarkably, an exceptionally high chemical stability in reducing conditions and redox cycles at high temperature, usually unattainable for Bi2O3-based materials, is achieved. Even more interestingly, at low oxygen partial pressure the layered material shows anomalous high conductivity, equal or superior to pure δ-Bi2O3 in air. This suggests a strategy to design and stabilize new materials that are comprised of intrinsically unstable but high-performing component materials.
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The authors would like to thank C. R. Graves for valuable suggestions and discussions and for critically reading the manuscript. O. Balmes is also acknowledged for his valuable help during the experiments at beam line ID03 at the ESRF. We also appreciate the help of E. Abdellahi with the preparation of (S)TEM specimens. We gratefully acknowledge The Danish Council for Independent Research |Natural Sciences, for travel support in connection with the synchrotron experiments, through the DANSCATT grant. The A.P. Møller and Chastine Mc-Kinney Møller Foundation are gratefully acknowledged for their contribution towards the establishment of the Center for Electron Nanoscopy in the Technical University of Denmark.
Simone Sanna and Vincenzo Esposito: These authors contributed equally to this work.
Department of Energy Conversion and Storage, Technical University of Denmark, DTU Risø Campus, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark
Simone Sanna, Vincenzo Esposito, Jens Wenzel Andreasen, Johan Hjelm, Wei Zhang, Søren Bredmose Simonsen, Søren Linderoth & Nini Pryds
Center for Electron Nanoscopy, Technical University of Denmark Lyngby Campus, DK-2800 Kgs.Lyngby, Denmark
Department of Chemistry & iNANO, Center for Materials Crystallography, Aarhus University, DK-8000 Aarhus C, Denmark
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S.S., V.E., S.L. and N.P. designed this project. V.E. elaborated the concept and S.S. developed the heterostructure layered architectures. S.S. deposited the thin films by PLD. S.S. and J.W.A. performed structural characterization by XRD and synchrotron light experiments. S.S. and M.C. performed structural characterization by high-temperature XRD. W.Z., T.K. and S.B.S. performed STEM and HRTEM characterizations. S.S., V.E. and J.H. performed the electrical characterization. S.S., V.E. and N.P. analysed the data and wrote the manuscript.
The authors declare no competing financial interests.
Sanna, S., Esposito, V., Andreasen, J. et al. Enhancement of the chemical stability in confined δ-Bi2O3. Nature Mater 14, 500–504 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat4266
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat4266
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Nature Materials (Nat. Mater.) ISSN 1476-4660 (online) ISSN 1476-1122 (print)
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