Thermal-Expansion Behaviors and Mechanisms for Ca- or Sr-Doped Lanthanum Manganite Perovskites under Oxidizing Atmospheres

The thermal expansion behavior and mechanism of A-site-deficient lanthanum manganite perovskites, La{sub 1{minus}x}MnO{sub 3} (0 < x {le} 0.1), and alkaline earth metal (AE)-doped lanthanum manganite perovskites, La{sub 1{minus}x}AE{sub x}MnO{sub 3} (AE = Ca and Sr, 0 {le} x {le} 0.4), under oxidizing atmospheres have been investigated. The average linear thermal expansion coefficients of the AE-doped lanthanum manganites decreased with increasing Ca content up to 20 mol % and with increasing Sr content up to 10 mol %, and then increased. During the thermal cycle measurement, the La{sub 1{minus}x}MnO{sub 3} (0 {le} x {le} 0.1) perovskite samples and the La{sub 1{minus}x}AE{sub x}MnO{sub 3} perovskites (0 {le} x {le} 0.3) shrank, while no anomalous shrinkage behavior was observed for the La{sub 0.6}AE{sub 0.4}MnO{sub 3} samples. From the results of high-temperature X-ray diffraction analysis, no dependency of cell volume of the perovskites on aging time at selected temperatures and on thermal cycles was observed.