AC impedance spectroscopy and conductivity studies of Dy doped Bi4V2O11 ceramics

The ac impedance and conductivity properties of Dy doped Bi4V2 - xDyxO11 (x = 0.05, 0.10, 0.15 and 0.20) ceramics prepared by solid-state reaction technique, in a wide frequency range at different temperatures have been studied. All the samples exhibited b-type phase orthorhombic structure at room temperature. The Nyquist plot confirmed the presence of both grain and grain boundary effects for all Dy doped samples. Double relaxation behavior was also observed. The grain and grain boundary resistance decreases with rise in temperature for all the concentration and exhibits a typical negative temperature co-efficient of resistance (NTCR) behavior. An analysis of the electric modulus suggests the possible hopping mechanism for electrical transport processes of all the materials. The ac conductivity spectrum obeys Jonscher’s universal power law. DC conductivity of the materials were also studied and values of the activation energy found to be 0.40, 0.49, 0.73 and 0.78 eV for the compositions x = 0.05, 0.10, 0.15 and 0.20, respectively, at different temperatures (150–375 C).