Analysis and manipulation of ferroelectric/ferroelastic architectures in (110)-oriented PZT thin films

Abstract

Complex oxides provide a variety of intriguing functionalities including high temperature superconductivity multiferroics high-dielectricity colossal magnetoresistance and so on Abundant researches related to the modulation of these intriguing phenomena via external stimuli have been accomplished which provide great insight into the development of next-generation electronic devices Among these functional materials Lead zirconate titanate (Pb(ZrxTi1-x)O3 PZT) is the most commonly studied materials in both industry and academic community due to its remarkable piezoelectricity and corresponding adjustability under controllable fabrication conditions Ferroelectric PZT thin films exhibit very different ferroelectric domain structure dependent on the orientation of epitaxial substrate However most of previous researches focus on (100)-oriented PZT system while the researches for others epitaxial orientation remains scarce In this study we investigate the ferroelectric domain structure and dynamic switching behavior of (110)-oriented Pb(Zr0 2Ti0 8)O3 thin films by employing piezoresponse force microscopy (PFM) We observe the (110)-oriented PZT behaves an unreported mixed-phase system which is composed of two degenerate phases T- and M-phase It is striking to note that a phase transition between T- and M-phase could be driven by the scanning of a biased AFM tip which indicates the (110)-oriented PZT has potential for the development of novel phase transition memory Our results also reveals that the mechanism of phase transition and the final configuration of T- and M-phase is dominant by the evolution of the space charge distribution driven by electric field

Date of Award	2019
Original language	English
Supervisor	Yi-Chun Chen (Supervisor)