Our study is focused to promote ductility of hard and brittle ceramics and to reduce time and energy consumption in sintering and forming of ceramics. Recent research topics are as follows:

• Room-temperature plasticity of ceramics at microscopic scales
• Low-temperature and high-speed sintering of ceramics in electric fields (flash sintering)
• Superplasticity of ceramics and its promotion using electric fields

1. R. Nakamura, H. Masuda, H. Yoshida, “Nanoindentation responses near single grain boundaries in oxide ceramics,” J. Am. Ceram. Soc., 106 (2023) 2061–2072.
2. H. Masuda, K. Morita, T. Tokunaga, T. Yamamoto, H. Yoshida, “Anelasticity induced by AC flash processing of cubic zirconia,” Acta Mater. 227 (2022) 117704.
3. H. Motomura, D. Tamao, K. Nambu, H. Masuda, H. Yoshida, “Athermal effect of flash event on high-temperature plastic deformation in Y₂O₃-stabilized tetragonal ZrO₂ polycrystal,” J. Eur. Ceram. Soc. 42 (2022) 5045–5052.
4. H. Masuda, K. Morita, M. Watanabe, T. Hara, H. Yoshida, T. Ohmura, “Ferroelastic and plastic behaviors in pseudo-single crystal micropillars of nontransformable tetragonal zirconia,” Acta Mater. 203 (2021) 116471.
5. H. Masuda, E. Sato, “Diffusional and dislocation accommodation mechanisms in superplastic materials,” Acta Mater. 197 (2020) 235–252.