Colossal Dielectric Response and Electric Polarization in Lithium Nitrate

2025/02/27 by Na Du, Du, Na, Yan Zhao +9
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Applied Physics (physics.app-ph) #Chemical Physics (physics.chem-ph) #FOS: Physical sciences #Ferroelectric and Piezoelectric Materials #Materials Science (cond-mat.mtrl-sci) #Photorefractive and Nonlinear Optics #Solid-state spectroscopy and crystallography

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2502.19919

openalex publication_date 2025/02/27 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

Lithium nitrate LiNO₃ is identified to possess a dielectric constant ε' larger than 6x10⁶ at 1 kHz in powder samples above the critical temperature T_W = 306 K. For single crystalline samples, ε' can be sustained to remain above 10⁵ and the dissipation factor below 10 in the temperature region of 280-340 K after a simple 'activation' process. Moreover, pyroelectric current measurements show LiNO₃ to be ferroelectric with an electric polarization of P = 1,200 μC/cm². Both ε' and P are amongst one of the highest in all known materials. We propose a model suggesting the mechanism underlying the colossal magnitudes of ε' and P to stem from a gearing-ungearing process of the planar NO₃^- at the macroscopic level. Our results potentially push the boundaries of ceramic capacitors.

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