Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.

Isaku Kanno

Ryoichi Takayama

Osamu Watanabe

Kenji Tomita

Satoru Fujii

Takeshi Kamada

Koji Matsuo

Hidetoshi Tanoue

Hideki Kuwajima

Masaya Nakatani

Hideo Torii

Shinichi Yamamoto

Kazuo Yokoyama

Kaoru Matsuoka

Koji Nomura

Atsushi Tomozawa

Yousuke N Irie

Eiichiro Tanaka

Shigeyuki Takao

Katsumasa Miki

Takanori Nakano

Kenichi Sakamoto

Shintaro Hara

Shintarou Hara

Toshiyuki Matsunaga

In a piezoelectric element comprising a first electrodeprovided on a substrate, a piezoelectric materialprovided on the first electrodeand a second electrodeprovided on the piezoelectric material, the piezoelectric materialis configured so as to have a perovskite type crystal structure which is represented by a formula ABOand in which the main component for the A site is Pb and the main components for the B site are Zr, Ti and Pb, and configured so that a ratio of Pb atoms to all atoms in the B site is more than 3% and not more than 30%. Namely, the piezoelectric materialis formed so as to contain Pb excessively and the excess Pb atoms are activated to be Pbduring formation of the piezoelectric materialand then introduced into the B site.

Piezoelectric body, manufacturing method thereof, piezoelectric element having the piezoelectric body, inject head, and inject type recording device

To manufacture a compact and high-performance thin-film piezoelectric bimorph element at low cost, first and second piezoelectric thin films () are formed by sputtering on the both surfaces of a metal thin plate () which are opposing relation to each other along the thickness thereof, while the respective states of polarizations of the first and second piezoelectric thin films () are controlled. A pair of electrode films () are formed on the respective surfaces of the first and second piezoelectric thin films () opposite to the metal thin plate ().

Method for controlling a direction of polarization of a piezoelectric thin film

A piezoelectric thin film can achieve a large piezoelectric displacement. A chemical composition of the piezoelectric thin film is expressed by Pb(ZrTi)O(0.2&#x2266;a&#x2266;0.6 and 0.50&#x2266;x&#x2266;0.62). The crystal structure of the piezoelectric thin film is a mixture of a perovskite columnar crystal region () having an ionic defect in which a portion of the constitutive elements of an oxygen ion, a titanium ion, and a zirconium ion is missing and a perovskite columnar crystal region () of stoichiometric composition having no ionic defect. This configuration allows a residual compressive stress in the crystal to be relaxed by the perovskite columnar crystal region () having an ionic defect, thus achieving a large piezoelectric displacement (displacement amount).

PIEZOELECTRIC THIN FILM AND METHOD FOR PREPARATION THEOF, AND PIEZOELECTRIC ELEMENT HAVING THE PIEZOELECTRIC THIN FILM, INK-JET HEAD USING THE PIEZOELECTRIC ELEMENT, AND INK-JET RECORDING DEVICE HAVING THE INK-JET HEAD

A head support mechanism includes a head and a slider for carrying the head, the head being caused to track by main driver, wherein the head support mechanism further includes sub-driving device including a thin film and causing the head to have a micro-movement; and the sub-driving device causes the head to have a micro-movement by utilizing flexural deformation of the thin film.

Head support mechanism, information recording/reproducing apparatus, and method of manufacturing head support mechanism

To provide a piezoelectric thin film having an improved and stable characteristic by controlling stress applied during forming a piezoelectric thin film and providing the piezoelectric thin film having a perovskite structure. A thin film piezoelectric element in which a lower electrode is formed on a substrate, a piezoelectric thin film containing lead is formed on the lower electrode, and an upper electrode is further placed on the piezoelectric thin film, characterized in that the piezoelectric thin film is a dielectric with the perovskite structure having lead, zirconium, and titanium as the main ingredients, and is in a composition region in which, in the composition of the whole piezoelectric thin film, the. Zr/(Zr+Ti) ratio is not less than substantially 0.53, and has a crystal structure of the tetragonal system in which a c axis is longer than an a axis.

Thin film piezoelectric element

A piezoelectric thin film element D, in which a piezoelectric thin film with first and second electrode films and respectively formed on its opposite surfaces in the thickness direction is held by a hold film , is fabricated by forming each film , and on a film formation substrate 11 and removing the film formation substrate by etching. Even when the hold film is made of material such as resin and therefore exhibits relatively poor adhesion with respect to the other films, the piezoelectric thin film is protected from damage by etchant because the first electrode film which comes into contact with the film formation substrate is formed such that the overall circumference of a peripheral edge portion of the first electrode film laterally extends beyond the lateral surface of the piezoelectric thin film and closely adheres to the hold film

Piezoelectric thin film element, ink jet recording head using such a piezoelectric thin film element, and their manufacture methods

In order to provide a miniaturized ink jet head having a piezoelectric actuator by which ink in a pressure chamber is emitted and to improve its productivity and reliability, a vibration plate is made up of two layers having different Young's moduli, i.e., a layer having a smaller Young's modulus and a layer having a greater Young's modulus. Further, the Young's modulus of each of the layers and is set at values ranging from 50 GPa to 350 GPa and the total thickness of the vibration plate is set at values ranging from 1 &mgr;m to 7 &mgr;m.

Ink jet head and method for the manufacture thereof

A fluid ejection device, such as for an ink jet printer or the like, having increased increasing nozzle density. A through-hole ( ) is provided in a glass substrate ( ) to which a second silicon substrate ( ) is directly bonded to form an ink outlet ( ). The first silicon substrate ( ) is etched to form a pressure chamber ( ), an ink channel ( ) and an ink inlet ( ), and bonded directly to the glass substrate ( ). A piezoelectric thin film ( ), having a conductive, elastic body ( ), is bonded to the first substrate covering the pressure chamber ( ). The elastic body ( ) is sandwiched between the piezoelectric thin film ( ) and a resin layer ( ). The second substrate ( ) has a thickness of less than about 0.8 mm in a range of thickness comprising about 1.2 to about 1.9 times (rg-rs), wherein rg is the diameter of the wide end of the through-hole ( ) and rs is the diameter of the narrow end of the through-hole ( ).

Fluid ejection device and process for the production thereof

Formed on a surface of an oscillation plate on the side of a head main body portion is an intermediate layer having a window portion through which a displacement portion of the oscillation plate is exposed to a pressure chamber. The intermediate layer and a compartmenting wall of the main body portion are adhered together by an adhesive of electro-deposition resin. The intermediate layer is formed of copper, having a thickness of 5 &mgr;m, so that, when a part of the adhesive is forced out, such a forced-out adhesive portion will not adhere to the displacement portion of the oscillation plate.

The method of manufacturing an ink-jet head of this invention includes the steps of forming plural individual electrodes and plural piezoelectric devices stacked in this order on a supporting substrate; flattening a top surface of the supporting substrate including the individual electrodes and the piezoelectric devices by filling a filler in a portion on the supporting substrate where the individual electrodes and the piezoelectric devices are not formed up to substantially the same level as a level of upper surfaces of the piezoelectric devices; forming a common electrode on the entire flattened top surface of the supporting substrate; fixing a pressure chamber part for forming pressure chambers on the common electrode; and removing the supporting substrate after fixing the pressure chamber part on the common electrode. Thus, the entire plane on which the common electrode is to be formed is flattened before forming the common electrode.

Ink-jet head and method of manufacturing the same

An ink jet including a head body including plural pressure chamber concaves each having a supply port for supplying ink and a discharge port for discharging ink, and a piezoelectric actuator including mutually electrically connected vibration plates that cover the concaves of the head body in order to form pressure chambers together with the concaves and are separately provided correspondingly to one or plural pressure chambers, piezoelectric device respectively provided on surfaces of the vibration plates opposite to the pressure chambers correspondingly to the pressure chambers and individual electrodes respectively provided on surfaces of said piezoelectric devices opposite to said vibration plates for applying a voltage to said piezoelectric devices together with said vibration plates. The vibration plates are deformed in a manner that volumes of the pressure chambers are decreased by applying a voltage to the piezoelectric devices through the vibration plates and the individual electrodes, whereby ink contained in the pressure chambers is discharged through the discharge ports. Additionally, a portion of each of the vibration plates corresponding to each of the pressure chambers is bent into a convex projecting toward an opposite direction to the corresponding pressure chamber due to a compressive internal stress action of each of the piezoelectric devices.

Ink-jet head with piezoelectric actuator

There is provided an ink-jet head having ink outlets formed at a high density for use in an ink-jet recorder. The ink-jet head comprises ink outlets, compression chambers communicating with the ink outlets, and piezoelectric vibration sections, each being provided on a part of each of the compression chambers and including a piezoelectric film containing Pb, Ti and Zr, and electrodes provided on both sides of the piezoelectric film. The piezoelectric film comprises a first layer and a second layer which each have a perovskite structure and are formed in contact with each other, wherein the first layer is formed as a layer containing no Zr or as a layer containing a smaller amount of Zr than that contained in the second layer.

Ink-jet head

The invention provides a compact and high performance infrared radiation detector. The infrared radiation detector contains: a substrate; and at least two infrared radiation detector units selected from the group consisting of a pyroelectric infrared radiation detector unit, a resistive bolometer type infrared radiation detector unit and a ferroelectric bolometer type infrared radiation detector unit, the infrared radiation detector units being disposed on the same side of the substrate.

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Nara, Japan

Isaku Kanno