Dynamic Conductivity of Ferroelectric Domain Walls in BiFeO₃

Journal Article · Tue Apr 12 04:00:00 EDT 2011 · Nano Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1021/nl104363x· OSTI ID:1337809

Maksymovych, Peter ^[1]; Seidel, Jan ^[2]; Chu, Ying Hao ^[3]; Wu, Pingping ^[4]; Baddorf, Arthur P. ^[1]; Chen, Long-Qing ^[4]; Kalinin, Sergei V. ^[1]; Ramesh, Ramamoorthy ^[2]

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1. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences
2. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Materials Sciences Division; Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States). Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering. Dept. of Physics
3. National Chiao Tung Univ., Hsin Chu (Taiwan). Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering
4. Pennsylvania State Univ., University Park, PA (United States). Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering

Topological walls separating domains of continuous polarization, magnetization, and strain in ferroic materials hold promise of novel electronic properties, that are intrinsically localized on the nanoscale and that can be patterned on demand without change of material volume or elemental composition. In this paper, we have revealed that ferroelectric domain walls in multiferroic BiFeO₃ are inherently dynamic electronic conductors, closely mimicking memristive behavior and contrary to the usual assumption of rigid conductivity. Applied electric field can cause a localized transition between insulating and conducting domain walls, tune domain wall conductance by over an order of magnitude, and create a quasicontinuous spectrum of metastable conductance states. Our measurements identified that subtle and microscopically reversible distortion of the polarization structure at the domain wall is at the origin of the dynamic conductivity. Finally, the latter is therefore likely to be a universal property of topological defects in ferroelectric semiconductors.

• Research Organization: Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES) (SC-22)
• Contributing Organization: Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States); Pennsylvania State Univ., University Park, PA (United States); National Chiao Tung Univ., Hsin Chu (Taiwan)
• OSTI ID: 1337809
• Journal Information: Nano Letters, Journal Name: Nano Letters Journal Issue: 5 Vol. 11; ISSN 1530-6984
• Publisher: American Chemical Society
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS
SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY
bismuth ferrite
conductivity
domain wall
ferroelectric
memristive system
pinning