GROWTH AND CHARACTERIZATION OF $La_3Ga_5SiO_{14}$ SINGLE CRYSTALS BY THE FLOATING ZONE METHOD

The development of telecommunication and information technology requires to develop new piezoelectric materials with small size, low impedance, wide pass band width and high thermal stability of frequency. Langasite (La3Ga5SiO14) single crystal has been researched substitute of quartz and LiNbO3 for the applications of SAW filter, BAW filter and resonator. Its single crystal growth has been carried out by Czochralski Method. So, in order to get single crystal with higher quality, in this study, lnagasite (La3Ga5SiO14) single crystal was grown by using Floating Zone (FZ) method and characterized. For the growth of langasite single crystals, the langasite powder was synthesized at 135$0^{\circ}C$ for 5hrs and the feed rod was sintered at 135$0^{\circ}C$ for 5hrs. The growing rate was 1.5mm/h and the rotation speed was 15 rpm for an upper rotation and 13 rpm for a lower rotation. In order to prevent the evaporation of gallium oxide, Ar and O2 gas mixture was flowed. The growth direction was analyzed by Laue back-scattered analysis. The composition of grown crystal was analyzed suing XRD and WDS. The electrical properties of grown crystal at various frequencies and temperature were discussed.