Electronic devices are produced from dielectric compositions comprising a mixture of precursor materials that, upon firing, forms a dielectric material comprising a barium-strontium-titanium-tungsten-silicon oxide.

A manufacturing method of ceramic powder includes mixing a barium carbonate having a specific surface are of 15 m.sup.2/g or more, a titanium dioxide having a specific surface area of 20 m.sup.2/g or more, a first compound of a donor element having a larger valence than Ti, and a second compound of an acceptor element having a smaller valence than Ti and having a larger ion radium than Ti and the donor element, and synthesizing barium titanate powder by calcining the barium carbonate, the titanium dioxide, the first compound and the second compound until a specific surface area of the barium titanate powder becomes 4 m.sup.2/g or more and 25 m.sup.2/g or less.

[Object] To provide a sputtering target for producing an oxide semiconductor thin film having high properties, which serves as a substitute for IGZO, and a method of producing the same.

[Solving Means] In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, a sputtering target according to an embodiment of the present invention includes: an oxide sintered body including indium, tin, and germanium, in which an atom ratio of germanium with respect to a total of indium, tin, and germanium is 0.07 or more and 0.40 or less, and an atom ratio of tin with respect to the total of indium, tin, and germanium is 0.04 or more and 0.60 or less. As a result, it is possible to achieve transistor characteristics of having mobility of 10 cm.sup.2/Vs or more.

There are provided a cubic boron nitride sintered body having a surface also excellent in adhesiveness to a ceramic coating film, while having excellent wear resistance and defect resistance, and a manufacturing method thereof, and a tool. The cubic boron nitride sintered body of the present invention includes 60.0 to 90.0% by volume of cubic boron nitride, the remainder being a binder phase, wherein the binder phase contains: at least any of a nitride, a boride, and an oxide of Al; at least any of a carbide, a nitride, a carbonitride, and a boride of Ti; and a compound represented by the following formula (1):
W.sub.2Ni.sub.xCo.sub.(1-x)B.sub.2(0.40≤x<1)  (1).

Provided are an oxide semiconductor excellent in transparency, mobility, and weatherability, etc., and a semiconductor device having the oxide semiconductor, a p-type semiconductor being realizable in the oxide semiconductor. The oxide semiconductor consists of a composite oxide, which has a crystal structure including a pyrochlore structure, containing at least one or more kinds of elements selected from Nb and Ta, and containing Sn element, and its holes become charge carriers by the condition that Sn.sup.4+/(Sn.sup.2++Sn.sup.4+) which is a ratio of Sn.sup.4+ to a total amount of Sn in the composite oxide is 0.124≤Sn.sup.4+/(Sn.sup.2++Sn.sup.4+)≤0.148.

A target for sputtering which enables to attain high rate film-formation of a transparent conductive film suitable for a blue LED or a solar cell. A oxide sintered body includes an indium oxide and a cerium oxide, and one or more oxide of titanium, zirconium, hafnium, molybdenum and tungsten. The cerium content is 0.3 to 9% by atom, as an atomicity ratio of Ce/(In+Ce), and the content of cerium is equal to or lower than 9% by atom, as an atomicity ratio of Ce/(In+Ce). The oxide sintered body has an In.sub.2O.sub.3 phase of a bixbyite structure has a CeO.sub.2 phase of a fluorite-type structure finely dispersed as crystal grains having an average particle diameter of equal to or smaller than 3 μm.

Process for preparing a porous monolith comprising between 10% and 100% by weight of a semiconductor relative to the total weight of the porous monolith, which process comprises the following steps: a) a first aqueous suspension containing polymer particles is prepared; b) a second aqueous suspension containing particles of least one inorganic semiconductor is prepared; c) the two aqueous suspensions prepared in steps a) and b) are mixed in order to obtain a paste; d) a heat treatment of the paste obtained in step c) is carried out in order to obtain the monolith with multimodal porosity.

Particles of a refractory metal or a refractory-metal compound capable of decomposing or reacting into refractory-metal nanoparticles, elemental silicon, and an organic compound having a char yield of at least 60% by weight are combined to form a precursor mixture. The mixture is heating, forming a thermoset and/or metal nanoparticles. Further heating form a composition having nanoparticles of a refractory-metal silicide and a carbonaceous matrix. The composition is not in the form of a powder

The present invention is a piezoelectric composition and a piezoelectric element using the piezoelectric composition, the composition being characterized by: having a Perovskite structure represented by general formula ABO3; being represented by composition formula x(Bi0.5K0.5)TiO3-yBi(Mg0.5Ti0.5)O3-zBiFeO3, x+y+z=1 in the composition formula above; and in a triangular coordinate using x, y and z in the composition formula above, having a composition represented by a region which is surrounded by a pentagon ABCDE with apexes of point A (1, 0, 0), point B (0.7, 0.3, 0), point C (0.1, 0.3, 0.6), point D (0.1, 0.1, 0.8) and point E (0.2, 0, 0.8) and which does not include the line segment AE that connects point A (1, 0, 0) and point E (0.2, 0, 0.8).

A W.sub.18O.sub.49 peak is confirmed by X-ray diffraction analysis of a sputtering surface and a cross section orthogonal to the sputtering surface, a ratio I.sub.S(103)/I.sub.S(010) of a diffraction intensity I.sub.S(103) of a (103) plane to a diffraction intensity I.sub.S(010) of a (010) plane of W.sub.18O.sub.49 of the sputtering surface is 0.38 or less, a ratio I.sub.C(103)/I.sub.C(010) of a diffraction intensity I.sub.C(103) of the (103) plane to a diffraction intensity I.sub.C(010) of the (010) plane of W.sub.18O.sub.49 of the cross section is 0.55 or more, and an area ratio of W.sub.18O.sub.49 phase of a surface parallel to the sputtering surface is 37% or more.