Low-temperature sintering of zirconia and zirconia-alumina composite nano-powders.

Nano-sized yttria-stabilized zirconia powder, which only contain extremely small aggregates was prepared. The control of agglomeration in this powder is of utmost importance in order to obtain highly sinter-reactive ceramic. The nanosized aggregates appear to be the smallest microstructural units, which determine the resulting green microstructure and sintering behavior. We showed that dense nano-structured ceramic, with density close to theoretical maximum and average grain size of similar to 120 nm, have been prepared by low-temperature sintering of hydrolytic-derived 3mol% yttria-stabilized zirconia and zirconia-alumina composite nano-powders.