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Title: Interfacial-Strain-Controlled Ferroelectricity in Self-Assembled BiFeO3 Nanostructures

Journal Article · · Advanced Functional Materials

Self-assembled BiFeO3-CoFe2O4 (BFO-CFO) vertically aligned nanocomposites are promising for logic, memory, and multiferroic applications, primarily due to the tunability enabled by strain engineering at the prodigious epitaxial vertical interfaces. However, local investigations directly revealing functional properties in the vicinity of such critical interfaces are often hampered by the size, geometry, microstructure, and concomitant experimental artifacts. Ferroelectric switching in the presence of lateral distributions of vertical strain thus remains relatively unexplored, with broader implications for all strain-engineered functional devices. Additionally, by implementing tomographic atomic force microscopy, 3D domain orientation mapping, and spatially-resolved ferroelectric switching movies, local tensile strain significantly impacts the ferroelectric switching, principally by retarding domain nucleation in the BFO nearest to the vertically epitaxial tensile-strained interfaces. The relaxed centers of the BFO pillars become preferred domain nucleation and growth sites for low biases, with up to an order of magnitude change in the edge:center switching ratio for high biases. The new, multi-dimensional imaging approach—and its corresponding insights especially for directly strained interface effects on local properties—thereby advances the fundamental understanding of polarization switching and provides design principles for optimizing functional response in confined nanoferroic systems.

Research Organization:
Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA); USDOE Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program; National Science Foundation (NSF)
Grant/Contract Number:
89233218CNA000001; DMR-1726862; CBET-2006028; ACI-1548562; ACI-1445606
OSTI ID:
1840884
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-21-22846
Journal Information:
Advanced Functional Materials, Vol. 31, Issue 34; ISSN 1616-301X
Publisher:
WileyCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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