Dielectric ceramic, manufacturing method thereof, and multilayer ceramic capacitor

Abstract

A dielectric ceramic formed by firing in a reducing atmosphere is provided. A multilayer ceramic capacitor formed by using the aforementioned dielectric ceramic has superior reliability even when the thicknesses of dielectric ceramic layers formed therefrom are reduced. The dielectric ceramic has crystal grains; and crystal boundaries and triple points, which are located between the crystal grains. The crystal grains contain perovskite compound grains composed of a perovskite compound represented by ABO3 (where A is Ba and Ca, or Ba, Ca and Sr; B is Ti, or Ti and a part thereof which is replaced with at least one of Zr and Hf) and crystal oxide grains composed of a crystal oxide containing at least Ba, Ti and Si, and about 80% or more of the number of the triple points each have a cross-sectional area of about 8 nm2 or less.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.