Abstract

Preparation of rare-earth aluminate glasses by powder sintering and nano-ceramics by glass crystallization: A mini-review

Author(s): Guanghua Liu, Jiangtao Li, Lin Mei, Lili Wang, Gang He

Rare-earth aluminate glasses and ceramics have good chemical stability and unique optical properties, and are attractive for a large variety of applications. Rare-earth aluminate glasses can be produced bymelt casting, but the sample size is strictly limited because of the high cooling rate required. Recently, a new method of powder sintering has been developed to prepare rare-earth aluminate glasses with much larger sample sizes. Furthermore, by crystallization of the rare-earth aluminate glasses, highlydense and transparent nano-ceramics have been obtained, which is a great challenge for conventional crystalline powder sintering. This article gives a brief review on the preparation of rare-earth aluminate glasses and nanoceramics by powder sintering and glass crystallization. Several examples are presented to show the processing and applicability of the new method.