New Approach to Analysis of the Switching Current Data, Recorded During Conventional Hysteresis Measurements

Abstract

The explanation of fatigue as a spatially non-uniform kinetic imprint due to evolution of the local threshold field distribution function has been proposed by us recently. In this paper we propose a new switching current analysis which allows to extract the distribution function from the data of conventional hysteresis loop measurements. Domain kinetics in slow-increasing field in spatially inhomogeneous ferroelectric was investigated by computer simulation. Domain arising and growth were considered under assumption that the threshold field for appearance of isolated nuclei is essentially higher than for nuclei at the domain wall. The obtained approach essentially differs from Preisach one. The proposed method has been applied for analysis of the switching current data measured during fatigue cycling in PZT and PLZT thin films. The fitting formula for dependence of switching charge and current maximum on the cycle number has been proposed and successively used for experimental data. The proposed method can accelerate the fatigue testing.

Kinetics of ferroelectric switching in unipolar (CH3NH3)5Bi2Br11crystal

“…It was assumed that in thin films the switching is limited by the nucleation of reversed domains rather than by the sidewise motion of domain walls; therefore the switching kinetics was described in terms of the distribution function of the nucleation probabilities. Another approach for investigation of the polarization reversal in inhomogeneous media was developed by the group of Shur [20,21]. It has been shown that analysis of the switching current data, recorded during quasi-static switching in slow increasing field, enables to extract the distribution function of the local internal bias fields and their evolution during polarization reversal in ferroelectric thin films.…”

In situsynchrotron x-ray diffraction study of electrical field induced fatigue in Pt/PbZr0.45Ti0.55O3/Pt ferroelectric capacitors

“…It is seen that the switching charge decrease (i.e. fatigue) for a number of switching cycles larger than 1 × 10 5 (figure 2(b)) is followed by an essential increase of the halfwidth σ of the switching current peak versus applied voltage [23] measured during cycling (the decrease of 1/σ is shown in figure 4). The widening of the switching current peak reveals the growth of frozen domains in the ferroelectric film.…”

“…The widening of the switching current peak reveals the growth of frozen domains in the ferroelectric film. A dependence of the dispersion on the number of cycles N for the fatigue stage has been recently proposed [23]:…”

Spatial heterogeneity of piezoelectric properties in fatigued lead zirconate titanate ceramics

“…Such non-uniform bias field leads to the local variation of the switching time thus resulting in the observed heterogeneity of the switching characteristics in different regions of the sample. The heterogeneity of the local switching times is also the reason of observed tilting of the hysteresis loops [18,19].…”