High Toughness Zirconia Ceramics Breakthrough Industrial Materials

High Toughness Zirconia Ceramics Breakthrough Industrial Materials

Zirconia ceramics, with its unique properties of combining rigidity and flexibility, have overturned the limitations of high brittleness in traditional ceramics and are known as "ceramic steel". Its Vickers hardness reaches 1250, and its fracture toughness (8-10 MPa · m ¹/²) is more than three times that of traditional ceramics. At the same time, it has a bending strength of 1200 MPa, which is close to the level of alloy steel. This characteristic originates from the phase transition toughening mechanism - tetragonal zirconia transforms into monoclinic phase under stress, absorbing 400 J/m ² fracture energy and forming a crack resistance characteristic similar to that of a metal. Its thermal expansion coefficient (10.5 × 10 ⁻⁶/℃) is close to that of metals, and its wear resistance is 2-3 times that of tungsten carbide hard alloys, making it an ideal material for metal ceramic composite devices.

The Y-PSZ and Mg PSZ systems developed through stabilizer doping technology are tailored to different industrial needs: the former exhibits excellent toughness under dynamic loads and is widely used in precision cutting tools; The latter is resistant to high temperatures of 800 ℃ and is suitable for aircraft engine components. The current applications have covered multiple fields: in the medical field, the anti fragmentation performance of all ceramic dental crowns has been improved by 40%, 5G filter substrates utilize their high dielectric constant (38-45) to optimize signal transmission, and solid oxide fuel cells rely on their ion conductivity characteristics.

With the advancement of 3D printing technology, zirconia ceramics are breaking through the manufacturing bottleneck, achieving precise shaping of porous structures, and opening up new applications in the fields of bone scaffolds and catalytic carriers. In the future, this intelligent material may integrate sensing functions and further expand to aerospace thermal protection systems, continuously promoting industrial technological innovation.