${\mathrm{BaTiO}}_3$ (BT) is the best-known ferroelectric and $\mathrm{Pb}{\mathrm{Mg}}_{1/3}{\mathrm{Nb}}_{2/3}{\mathrm{O}}_3$ (PMN) is the best-known relaxor ferroelectric, but their solid solutions were so far studied only very scarcely. Here the high-density perovskite ceramic solid solutions of $\left(1-x\right){\mathrm{BaTiO}}_3\text{−}x\mathrm{Pb}{\mathrm{Mg}}_{1/3}{\mathrm{Nb}}_{2/3}{\mathrm{O}}_3$ (BT-100$x$%PMN, $x=0.075$, 0.10, 0.15) were studied by the infrared reflectivity, time-domain terahertz transmission and microwave spectroscopies (1 MHz–20 THz) and compared with the undoped BT and PMN ceramics. The spectra show presence of a split soft phonon at all temperatures, similar to that observed in BT and PMN. Microwave dielectric dispersion was observed both below and above temperature of the diffuse permittivity maximum. In the case of BT-7.5%PMN and BT-10%PMN, the main dispersion takes place above 1 GHz, in case of the BT-15%PMN, the dispersion covers more homogeneously the 1 MHz–1 THz range. The dielectric response up to the THz range of the BT-10%PMN and BT-15%PMN was fitted with three excitations: soft mode, central mode (lower-frequency component of the split soft phonon), and microwave relaxation, but the soft mode does not soften appreciably and only the latter two excitations contribute substantially to the dielectric permittivity maximum. Dielectric response of the BT-7.5%PMN is similar except for the presence of a second dielectric relaxation in the MHz range, also observed in BT. The relaxations show no PMN-like freezing and can be tentatively attributed to the dynamics of polar nanoregions in the paraelectric phase and to the domain/nanodomain wall dynamics and/or acoustic wave emission and piezoelectric resonances within the grains in the ferroelectric phase. In this way, the BT-100$x$%PMN ceramics cannot be considered as relaxor ferroelectrics, but rather as ferroelectrics with the diffuse phase transition. The broadband dielectric spectra of undoped BT ceramics revealed a split optical soft mode and two additional dielectric relaxations which are mainly responsible for the dielectric anomaly at the ferroelectric phase transition. It supports the phase transition in BT to be at the crossover from a displacive to an order-disorder type.

• Received 2 September 2020
• Revised 10 November 2020
• Accepted 22 December 2020

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevMaterials.5.014404