Nanoscale piezoresponse studies of ferroelectric domains in epitaxial BiFeO{sub 3} nanostructures

Journal Article · Sun Mar 15 00:00:00 EDT 2009 · Journal of Applied Physics

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.3055412· OSTI ID:21190072

Hong, Seungbum; Petford-Long, Amanda ^[1]; Klug, Jeffrey A ^[1]; Park, Moonkyu ^[1]; Imre, Alexandra; Auciello, Orlando ^[1]; Bedzyk, Michael J ^[1]; No, Kwangsoo ^[2]

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1. Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, 9700 South Cass Avenue, Lemont, Illinois 60439 (United States)
2. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 305701 (Korea, Republic of)

We report the dependence of the ferroelectric domain configuration and switching behavior on the shape (square versus round) of epitaxial BiFeO{sub 3} (BFO) nanostructures. We fabricated (001) oriented BFO(120 nm)/SrRuO{sub 3}(SRO,125 nm) film layers on (001) SrTiO{sub 3} single crystals by rf magnetron sputter deposition, and patterned them to square (500x500 nm{sup 2}) and round (502 nm in diameter) shaped nanostructures by focused ion-beam lithography. The surface morphology and the crystalline structure of the nanostructures were characterized by scanning electron microscopy and x-ray diffraction, respectively, while the domain configuration was investigated using piezoelectric force microscopy. We found that the square-shaped nanostructures exhibit a single variant domain configuration aligned along the [111] direction, whereas the round-shaped nanostructures exhibit seven variants of domain configuration along the [111], [111], [111], [111], [111], [111], and [111] directions. Moreover, local d{sub 33} piezoelectric coefficient measurements showed hysteresis loops with a strong displacement in the voltage axis (strong imprint) for the square-shaped nanostructures, while the round-shaped ones exhibited more symmetric loops. These findings have critical implications for the development of nanocapacitors for gigabyte to terabyte nonvolatile ferroelectric memories.

• OSTI ID: 21190072
• Journal Information: Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 105, Issue 6; Other Information: DOI: 10.1063/1.3055412; (c) 2009 American Institute of Physics; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0021-8979
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
BISMUTH COMPOUNDS
CAPACITORS
DEPOSITION
ELECTRIC POTENTIAL
EPITAXY
FERROELECTRIC MATERIALS
HYSTERESIS
ION BEAMS
IRON OXIDES
LAYERS
MONOCRYSTALS
MORPHOLOGY
NANOSTRUCTURES
PIEZOELECTRICITY
RUTHENIUM OXIDES
SCANNING ELECTRON MICROSCOPY
SPUTTERING
STRONTIUM TITANATES
THIN FILMS
X-RAY DIFFRACTION