A novel metal oxide or a novel sputtering target is provided. A sputtering target includes a conductive material and an insulating material. The insulating material includes an oxide, a nitride, or an oxynitride including an element M1. The element M1 is one or more kinds of elements selected from Al, Ga, Si, Mg, Zr, Be, and B. The conductive material includes an oxide, a nitride, or an oxynitride including indium and zinc. A metal oxide film is deposited using the sputtering target in which the conductive material and the insulating material are separated from each other.

Provided is a silicide-based alloy material with which environmental load can be reduced and high thermoelectric conversion performance can be obtained.

Provided is a silicide-based alloy material including silicon and ruthenium as main components, in which when the contents of silicon and ruthenium are denoted by Si and Ru, respectively, the atomic ratio of the devices constituting the alloy material satisfies the following:

45 atm %≤Si/(Ru+Si)≤70 atm %

30 atm %≤Ru/(Ru+Si)≤55 atm %.

A cBN-based ultra-high pressure sintered body contains cBN particles and a binder phase. The binder phase contains at least one of a nitride or oxide of Al or a nitride, carbide, or carbonitride of Ti, and a metal boride having an average particle diameter of 20 to 300 nm is dispersed in an amount of 0.1 to 5.0 vol % in the binder phase. The metal boride includes a metal boride (B) containing at least one of Nb, Ta, Cr, Mo, and W as a metal component and containing no Ti and a metal boride (A) containing only Ti as a metal component. In a case where a ratio (vol %) of the metal boride (A) in the metal boride is represented by V.sub.a and a ratio (vol %) of the metal boride (B) is represented by V.sub.b, a ratio of V.sub.b/V.sub.a is 0.1 to 1.0.

Certain embodiments of the present disclosure relate to ceramic materials with high thermal shock resistance and high erosion resistance. In one embodiment, a ceramic material is formed from a composition comprising Al.sub.2O.sub.3, MgO, SiO.sub.2.

An electrolyte sheet for solid oxide fuel cells includes a ceramic plate body containing a cubic zirconia sintered material, wherein, with the ceramic plate body being defined to have nine portions including an outer peripheral portion and a central portion, ceramic grains in each of the nine portions have a median size D.sub.50 of 1.0 μm to 4.0 μm, and a maximum median size D.sub.50 of the ceramic grains among the nine portions is 1.0 to 1.3 times a minimum median size D.sub.50 of the ceramic grains among the nine portions.

An oxide sintered body includes a bixbyite phase represented by In.sub.2O.sub.3, and a garnet phase represented by Y.sub.3In.sub.2Ga.sub.3O.sub.12.

Disclosed is a lithium complex oxide sintered plate including a plurality of primary grains having a layered rock-salt structure, the primary grains being bonded. The lithium complex oxide has a composition represented by the formula: Li.sub.x(Co.sub.1-yM.sub.y)O.sub.2±δ (wherein, 1.0≤x≤1.1, 0<y≤0.1, 0≤δ<1, and M is at least one selected from the group consisting of Mg, Ni, Al, and Mn), and the primary grains have a mean tilt angle of more than 0° to 30° or less, the mean tilt angle being a mean value of the angles defined by the (003) planes of the primary grains and the plate face of the lithium complex oxide sintered plate.

A ceramic structure includes aluminum oxide as a main component and aluminum titanate, and, in a surface layer region where a depth from a fired surface is within at least 5 mm, at least one of a surface resistance value or a surface resistivity increases in a power approximation or linear approximation manner from the fired surface in a normal direction. An electrostatic deflector includes a cylindrical substrate made of the ceramic structure and a plurality of electrodes provided on an inner peripheral portion of the cylindrical substrate.

Provided is a ceramic composite material and a wavelength converter. The ceramic composite material includes: an alumina matrix, a fluorescent powder uniformly distributed in the alumina matrix, and scattering centers uniformly distributed in the alumina matrix, wherein the alumina matrix is an alumina ceramics, the scattering centers are alumina particles, the alumina particles each have a particle diameter of 1 μm to 10 μm, and the fluorescent powder has a particle diameter of 13 μm to 20 μm.

Disclosed is a ceramic sintered body comprising magnesium aluminate spinel of composition MgAl.sub.2O.sub.4 having from 90 to 100% by volume of a cubic crystallographic structure and a density of from 3.47 to 3.58 g/cc, wherein the ceramic sintered body is free of sintering aids. A method of making the ceramic sintered body comprising spinel is also disclosed.