Sponsored by Park SystemsJan 21 2021
Ferroelectrics found extensive uses in industrial applications because of their unparalleled electromechanical and electrical characteristics, for example, as actuators, sensors and capacitors [1], [2].
The suitability of ferroelectrics for modern communication technology is currently investigated by researchers, including 5G [3] and as active layers in photovoltaics [4, 5] among other applications [6].
Ferroelectricity is the consequence of an alteration in crystal symmetry during a phase transition. A sudden electrical polarization is introduced by an off-centering of the center ion or tilting of ionic groups. The crystal forms domains of parallelly aligned polarization in order to reduce the electrostatic energy.
Without an external electric field, these domains are randomly oriented so that the macroscopic electrical polarization of the crystal stays fixed at zero (Figure 1a).