A ceramic composition contains Fe, Cu, Ni, Zn, Co, and Cr. When Fe, Cu, Ni, and Zn are converted to Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, CuO, NiO, and ZnO, respectively, and when a total amount of Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, CuO, NiO, and ZnO is 100 parts by mole, the ceramic composition contains 45.00 to 49.70 parts by mole Fe in terms of Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, 2.00 to 8.00 parts by mole Cu in terms of CuO, 19.40 to 45.40 parts by mole Ni in terms of NiO, and 1.00 to 27.00 parts by mole Zn in terms of ZnO. When Fe, Cu, Ni, and Zn are converted to Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, CuO, NiO, and ZnO, respectively, and when a total amount of Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, CuO, NiO, and ZnO is 100 parts by weight, the ceramic composition contains 5 to 100 ppm Co in terms of CoO and 10 to 400 ppm Cr in terms of Cr.sub.2O.sub.3.

A ceramic composition contains Fe, Cu, Ni, Zn, Co, and Cr. When Fe, Cu, Ni, and Zn are converted to Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, CuO, NiO, and ZnO, respectively, and a total amount of Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, CuO, NiO, and ZnO is 100 parts by mole, the ceramic composition contains from 48.20 to 49.85 parts by mole Fe in terms of Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, from 2.00 parts to 8.00 parts by mole Cu in terms of CuO, from 11.90 to 18.70 parts by mole Ni in terms of NiO, and from 27.00 to 33.50 parts by mole Zn in terms of ZnO. When Fe, Cu, Ni, and Zn are converted to Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, CuO, NiO, and ZnO, respectively, and a total amount of Fe.sub.2O.sub.3, CuO, NiO, and ZnO is 100 parts by weight, the ceramic composition contains from 5 to 100 ppm Co in terms of CoO and from 10 to 400 ppm in terms of Cr.sub.2O.sub.3.

The present invention provides an antimicrobial ceramic tile and manufacturing method thereof. A manufacturing method of an antimicrobial ceramic tile comprises: grinding soils into slurries; drying the slurries into powders by hot air; pressing the powders into a green body through a molding machine; dotting or spraying or showering a glaze slurry on the surface of the green body to form an engobe; dotting the glaze slurry on the engobe to form a ground glaze; mixing a surface glaze and an antimicrobial material into an antimicrobial glaze in a weight ratio of 100:5˜10; grinding water and the antimicrobial glaze into the antimicrobial glaze in a weight ratio of 5˜6:4˜5; and dotting antimicrobial glaze on the ground glaze; finally, rapidly firing the ceramic tile and the antimicrobial glaze into an antimicrobial ceramic tile.

A plant structure includes a ceramic member including at least one of an oxide or an oxide hydroxide as a main component and substantially including no hydrate, and a plant-derived substance directly fixed to the ceramic member without interposing an adhesive substance different from a ceramic material making up the ceramic member. A building member and an interior member each include the plant structure.

A hard lead zirconate titanate (PZT) ceramic has an ABO.sub.3 structure with A sites and B sites. The PZT ceramic is doped with Mn and with Nb on the B sites and the ratio Nb/Mn is <2. A piezoelectric multilayer component having such a PZT ceramic and also a method for producing a piezoelectric multilayer component are also disclosed.

A superconducting composition of matter including overlapping first and second regions. The regions comprise unit cells of a solid, the first region comprises an electrical insulator or semiconductor, and the second region comprises a metallic electrical conductor. The second region extends through the solid and a subset of said second region comprise surface metal unit cells that are adjacent to at least one unit cell from the first region. The ratio of the number of said surface metal unit cells to the total number of unit cells in the second region being at least 20 percent.

A method for manufacturing a sintered body, the method including heating a mixture that contains a plurality of particles of a metal oxide having a spinel-type structure, and a metal acetylacetonate under pressure at a temperature of from a melting point or higher of the metal acetylacetonate to 600° C. or lower, to form a sintered body that contains the metal oxide having the spinel-type structure.

A ferrite sintered magnet comprising an M type Sr ferrite having a hexagonal structure as a main phase, wherein the ferrite sintered magnet does not substantially comprise a rare earth element and Co, a content of B is 0.005 to 0.9% by mass in terms of B.sub.2O.sub.3, and a content of Zn is 0.01 to 1.2% by mass in terms of ZnO.

A dielectric composition includes a main ingredient having a perovskite structure represented by ABO.sub.3, where A is at least one of Ba, Sr, and Ca and B is at least one of Ti, Zr, and Hf, and a first accessory ingredient. The first accessory ingredient comprises 0.1 mole or more of a rare earth element, 0.02 mole or more of Nb, and 0.25 mole or more and 0.9 mole or less of Mg, a sum of contents of the rare earth element and Nb is 1.5 mole or less.

The present invention provides a method for producing a zirconia particle-containing powder that enables easy production of a zirconia sintered body having both high translucency and high strength. The present invention relates to a method for producing a zirconia particle-containing powder, comprising a drying step of spray drying a slurry containing zirconia particles, wherein the zirconia particles have an average primary particle diameter of 30 nm or less, and the slurry comprises a dispersion medium containing a liquid having a surface tension at 25° C. of 50 mN/m or less. Preferably, the zirconia particles comprise 2.0 to 9.0 mol % yttria. Preferably, wherein the content of the liquid in the dispersion medium is 50 mass % or more.