Thermodynamics of nanodomain formation and breakdown in scanning probe microscopy: Landau-Ginzburg-Devonshire approach / Morozovska Anna N.,Eliseev Eugene A.,Li Yulan,Svechnikov Sergei V.,Maksymovych Peter,Shur V. Y.,Gopalan Venkatraman,Chen Long-Qing,Kalinin Sergei V. // PHYSICAL REVIEW B. - 2009. - V. 80, l. 21.

ISSN/EISSN:

2469-9950 / 2469-9969

Type:

Article

Abstract:

Thermodynamics of tip-induced nanodomain formation in scanning probe microscopy of ferroelectric films and crystals is studied using the analytical Landau-Ginzburg-Devonshire approach and phase-field modeling. The local redistribution of polarization induced by the biased probe apex is analyzed including the effects of polarization gradients, field dependence of dielectric properties, intrinsic domain-wall width, and film thickness. The polarization distribution inside a ``subcritical{''} nucleus of the domain preceding the nucleation event is shown to be ``soft{''} (i.e., smooth without domain walls) and localized below the probe, and the electrostatic field distribution is dominated by the tip. In contrast, polarization distribution inside a stable domain is ``hard{''} (i.e., sharp contrast with delineated domain walls) and the spontaneous polarization reorientation takes place inside a localized spatial region, where the absolute value of the resulting electric field is larger than the thermodynamic coercive field. The calculated coercive biases corresponding to formation of switched domains are in a good agreement with available experimental results for typical ferroelectric materials. The microscopic origin of the observed domain-tip elongation in the region where the probe electric field is much smaller than the intrinsic coercive field is the positive depolarization field in front of the moving-counter domain wall. For infinitely thin domain wall the depolarization field outside the semiellipsoidal domain tip is always higher than the intrinsic coercive field that must initiate the local domain breakdown through the sample depth while the domain length is finite in the energetic approach evolved by Landauer and Molotskii (we refer the phenomenon as Landauer-Molotskii paradox). Our approach provides the solution of the paradox: the domain vertical growth should be accompanied by the increase in the charged domain-wall width.

Author keywords:

dielectric polarisation; electric domain walls; elongation; ferroelectric coercive field; ferroelectric thin films; ferroelectric transitions; nucleation; scanning probe microscopy; thermodynamics ATOMIC-FORCE MICROSCOPY; FERROELECTRIC DOMAIN-STRUCTURES; THIN-FILMS; PIEZOELECTRIC PROPERTIES; RELAXOR FERROELECTRICS; POLARIZATION REVERSAL; PHASE-TRANSITIONS; BARIUM TITANATE; SURFACE; FIELD

DOI:

10.1103/PhysRevB.80.214110

Web of Science ID:

ISI:000273228200031

Соавторы в МНС:

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Другие поля

Поле	Значение
Month	DEC
Publisher	AMER PHYSICAL SOC
Address	ONE PHYSICS ELLIPSE, COLLEGE PK, MD 20740-3844 USA
Language	English
Article-Number	214110
EISSN	2469-9969
Keywords-Plus	ATOMIC-FORCE MICROSCOPY; FERROELECTRIC DOMAIN-STRUCTURES; THIN-FILMS; PIEZOELECTRIC PROPERTIES; RELAXOR FERROELECTRICS; POLARIZATION REVERSAL; PHASE-TRANSITIONS; BARIUM TITANATE; SURFACE; FIELD
Research-Areas	Physics
Web-of-Science-Categories	Physics, Condensed Matter
Author-Email	morozo@i.com.ua sergei2@ornl.gov
ResearcherID-Numbers	Kalinin, Sergei/I-9096-2012 Maksymovych, Petro/C-3922-2016 Chen, LongQing/I-7536-2012 Shur, Vladimir/J-9078-2015
ORCID-Numbers	Kalinin, Sergei/0000-0001-5354-6152 Maksymovych, Petro/0000-0003-0822-8459 Chen, LongQing/0000-0003-3359-3781
Funding-Acknowledgement	Ministry of Science and Education of Ukraine {[}UU30/004]; National Science Foundation {[}DMR-0908718, DMR-0820404]; National Academy of Science of Ukraine; joint Russian-Ukrainian {[}NASU N 17-Ukr\_a, RFBR N 08-02-90434]; Division of Scientific User Facilities, U. S. DOE
Funding-Text	Research sponsored by Ministry of Science and Education of Ukraine (Grant No. UU30/004) and National Science Foundation (Grants No. DMR-0908718 and No. DMR-0820404 (.A.N.M. and S. V. S. gratefully acknowledge financial support from National Academy of Science of Ukraine, joint Russian-Ukrainian under Grants No. NASU N 17-Ukr\_a and No. RFBR N 08-02-90434. The research is supported in part (S.V.K.) by the Division of Scientific User Facilities, U. S. DOE.
Number-of-Cited-References	84
Usage-Count-Last-180-days	3
Usage-Count-Since-2013	30
Journal-ISO	Phys. Rev. B
Doc-Delivery-Number	539BK