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Title: Domain pinning near a single-grain boundary in tetragonal and rhombohedral lead zirconate titanate films

Journal Article · · Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter and Materials Physics
 [1];  [2];  [1];  [3];  [3];  [3];  [1];  [2];  [2];  [1];  [1]
  1. Pennsylvania State Univ., University Park, PA (United States). Dept of Materials Science and Engineering and Materials Research Inst.
  2. Univ. of Sheffield (United Kingdom). Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering
  3. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Center for Nanophase Materials Science (CNMS)

The interaction of grain boundaries with ferroelectric domain walls strongly influences the extrinsic contribution to piezoelectric activity in Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 (PZT), ubiquitous in modern transducers and actuators. However, the fundamental understanding of these phenomena has been limited by complex mechanisms originating from the interplay of atomic-level domain wall pinning, collective domain wall dynamics, and emergent mesoscopic behavior. This contribution utilizes engineered grain boundaries created by depositing epitaxial PZT films with various Zr:Ti ratio onto 24º SrTiO3 tilt bicrystals. The nonlinear piezoelectric response and surface domain structure across the boundary are investigated using piezoresponse force microscopy whilst cross section domain structure is studied using transmission electron microscopy. The grain boundary reduces domain wall motion over a width of 800±70 nm for PZT 45:55 and 450±30 nm for PZT 52:48. Phase field modeling provides an understanding of the elastic and electric fields associated with the grain boundary and local domain configurations. In conclusion, this study demonstrates that complex mesoscopic behaviors can be explored to complement atomic-level pictures of the material system.

Research Organization:
Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); National Science Foundation (NSF)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC05-00OR22725; FG02-07ER46417; OCI-0821527; CNMS2011-022; EP/I038934/1; DMR-1005771
OSTI ID:
1286789
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1178776
Journal Information:
Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter and Materials Physics, Vol. 9, Issue 13; ISSN 1098-0121
Publisher:
American Physical Society (APS)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 28 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (6)

Dynamical Magnetic Field Accompanying the Motion of Ferroelectric Domain Walls journal September 2019
Scaling Effects in Perovskite Ferroelectrics: Fundamental Limits and Process-Structure-Property Relations journal July 2016
Lead-reduced Bi(Ni 2/3 Ta 1/3 )O 3 -PbTiO 3 perovskite ceramics with high Curie temperature and performance journal August 2018
Big data and deep data in scanning and electron microscopies: deriving functionality from multidimensional data sets journal May 2015
Dynamical Magnetic Field Accompanying the Motion of Ferroelectric Domain Walls text January 2019
A dynamical magnetic field accompanying the motion of ferroelectric domain walls text January 2019

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