Strain gradients in epitaxial ferroelectrics

2004/11/18 by G. Catalan, Gustau Catalán, Beatriz Noheda +5 · 3 citations
Engineering · Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Acoustic Wave Resonator Technologies #Ferroelectric and Piezoelectric Materials #Multiferroics and related materials #cond-mat.mtrl-sci

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevb.72.020102

published as Physical Review B 72, 020102R (2005) · 4 pages, 3 embedded figures (1 color), revTex4

arxiv created 2004/11/18 · openalex publication_date 2005/07/14 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01

Abstract

X-ray analysis of ferroelectric thin layers of Ba_1∕2Sr_1∕2TiO₃ with different thicknesses reveals the presence of strain gradients across the films and allows us to propose a functional form for the internal strain profile. We use this to calculate the influence of strain gradient, through flexoelectric coupling, on the degradation of the ferroelectric properties of films with decreasing thickness, in excellent agreement with the observed behavior. This paper shows that strain relaxation can lead to smooth, continuous gradients across hundreds of nanometers, and it highlights the pressing need to avoid such strain gradients in order to obtain ferroelectric films with bulklike properties.

Citations

• X-ray line broadening from filed aluminium and wolfram
• Large flexoelectric polarization in ceramic lead magnesium niobate
• The internal electric field originating from the mismatch effect and its influence on ferroelectric thin film properties

Cited by

• Origin of ferroelastic domains in free-standing single-crystal ferroelectric films
• The Role of Flexoelectric Coupling and Chemical Strains in the Emergence of Polar Chiral Nano-Structures
• Flexoelectricity induced increase of critical thickness in epitaxial ferroelectric thin films