skip to main content
OSTI.GOV title logo U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Title: Emergent Low-Symmetry Phases and Large Property Enhancements in Ferroelectric KNbO 3 Bulk Crystals

Journal Article · · Advanced Materials
 [1];  [1];  [2];  [3];  [3];  [1];  [1];  [4];  [3];  [5];  [1]
  1. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802 USA
  2. School of Mathematics and Physics, Queen's University Belfast, University Road, Belfast BT71NN Northern Ireland UK
  3. Department of Physics, University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX 78712 USA
  4. Center for Nanoscale Materials, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne IL 60439 USA
  5. Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge TN 37831 USA
+ Show Author Affiliations

The design of new or enhanced functionality in materials is traditionally viewed as requiring the discovery of new chemical compositions through synthesis. Large property enhancements may however also be hidden within already well-known materials, when their structural symmetry is deviated from equilibrium through a small local strain or field. Here, the discovery of enhanced material properties associated with a new metastable phase of monoclinic symmetry within bulk KNbO3 is reported. This phase is found to coexist with the nominal orthorhombic phase at room temperature, and is both induced by and stabilized with local strains generated by a network of ferroelectric domain walls. While the local microstructural shear strain involved is only approximate to 0.017%, the concurrent symmetry reduction results in an optical second harmonic generation response that is over 550% higher at room temperature. Moreover, the meandering walls of the low-symmetry domains also exhibit enhanced electrical conductivity on the order of 1 S m(-1). This discovery reveals a potential new route to local engineering of significant property enhancements and conductivity through symmetry lowering in ferroelectric crystals.

Research Organization:
Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)
DOE Contract Number:
AC02-06CH11357
OSTI ID:
1389316
Journal Information:
Advanced Materials, Vol. 29, Issue 31; ISSN 0935-9648
Publisher:
Wiley
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

References (47)

Origin of morphotropic phase boundaries in ferroelectrics journal January 2008
Crystallographically engineered BaTiO3 single crystals for high-performance piezoelectrics journal September 1999
Charge-order domain walls with enhanced conductivity in a layered manganite journal July 2015
Monoclinic phases arising across thermal inter-ferroelectric phase transitions journal July 2014
Lead-free piezoceramics journal October 2004
Probing Ferroelectrics Using Optical Second Harmonic Generation journal August 2011
A Strain-Driven Morphotropic Phase Boundary in BiFeO3 journal November 2009
Nanoscale Hard X-Ray Microscopy Methods for Materials Studies journal July 2013
Refractive indices of orthorhombic KNbO_3 II Phase-matching configurations for nonlinear-optical interactions journal January 1992
Enhanced piezoelectric properties of barium titanate single crystals with different engineered-domain sizes journal July 2005
Elastic strain engineering of ferroic oxides journal February 2014
Modeling of kinematic diffraction from a thin silicon film illuminated by a coherent, focused X-ray nanobeam journal April 2010
Piezoelectric properties of domain engineered barium titanate single crystals with different volume fractions of domain walls journal September 2009
Bridging phases at the morphotropic boundaries of lead oxide solid solutions journal January 2006
Enhanced electromechanical response of ferroelectrics due to charged domain walls journal January 2012
Ab initio study of the phase diagram of epitaxial BaTiO 3 journal June 2004
Conduction at domain walls in oxide multiferroics journal January 2009
Molecular Mechanisms in Smart Materials journal May 1997
Large field-induced strains in a lead-free piezoelectric material journal January 2011
Ultrahigh strain and piezoelectric behavior in relaxor based ferroelectric single crystals journal August 1997
Domain-size dependence of piezoelectric properties of ferroelectrics journal July 2005
Batch-fabricated cantilever probes with electrical shielding for nanoscale dielectric and conductivity imaging journal October 2012
Materials constants of KNbO 3 relevant for electro‐ and acousto‐optics journal July 1993
Phase Transitions in Ferroelectric KNb O 3 journal February 1954
Tetragonal-to-monoclinic phase transition in a ferroelectric perovskite: The structure of PbZr 0.52 Ti 0.48 O 3 journal April 2000
Lead-free piezoceramics with giant strain in the system Bi0.5Na0.5TiO3–BaTiO3–K0.5Na0.5NbO3. I. Structure and room temperature properties journal February 2008
Multiferroics—toward strong coupling between magnetization and polarization in a solid journal March 2007
Origin of the High Piezoelectric Response in PbZr 1 − x Ti x O 3 journal June 2000
Domain Wall Engineering in Lead-Free Piezoelectric Crystals journal September 2007
Nanoscale microwave microscopy using shielded cantilever probes journal April 2011
Domain Wall Conduction and Polarization-Mediated Transport in Ferroelectrics journal April 2013
Enhancement of Ferroelectricity in Strained BaTiO3 Thin Films journal November 2004
Domain structures in orthorhombic KNbO3 and characterisation of single domain crystals journal January 1973
Stability of the monoclinic phase in the ferroelectric perovskite PbZr 1 − x Ti x O 3 journal December 2000
Critical features of colossal magnetoresistive manganites journal February 2006
Optical Second Harmonic Generation in Piezoelectric Crystals journal July 1964
Modeling and characterization of a cantilever-based near-field scanning microwave impedance microscope journal June 2008
High efficiency second-harmonic generation in KNbO3 crystals journal December 1983
Microwave a.c. conductivity of domain walls in ferroelectric thin films journal May 2016
Domain walls of ferroelectric BaTiO 3 within the Ginzburg-Landau-Devonshire phenomenological model journal April 2010
Absolute scale of second-order nonlinear-optical coefficients journal January 1997
Mobile metallic domain walls in an all-in-all-out magnetic insulator journal October 2015
Thermotropic phase boundaries in classic ferroelectrics journal January 2014
Creation and Destruction of Morphotropic Phase Boundaries through Electrical Poling: A Case Study of Lead-Free ( Bi 1 / 2 Na 1 / 2 ) TiO 3 − BaTiO 3 Piezoelectrics journal September 2012
Critical Features of Colossal Magnetoresistive Manganites journal August 2006
Lead-Free Piezoceramics. journal January 2005
Charge-order domain walls with enhanced conductivity in a layered manganite text January 2015

Cited By (5)

Unexpected Giant Microwave Conductivity in a Nominally Silent BiFeO 3 Domain Wall journal January 2020
Nonlinear optical potassium niobate nanocrystals as harmonic markers: the role of precursors and stoichiometry in hydrothermal synthesis journal January 2018
An intermediate metastable ferroelectric state induced giant functional responses in Bi 0.5 Na 0.5 TiO 3 ceramics journal January 2019
Emergent room temperature polar phase in CaTiO 3 nanoparticles and single crystals journal January 2019
Emergent room temperature polar phase in CaTiO3 nanoparticles and single crystals text January 2019

Similar Records

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE