Pyroelectricity and Spontaneous Polarization in [111] Oriented 0.955 Pb（Zn1/3Nb2/3）O3-0.045PbTiO3 Single Crystals

We report that the measurements of the pyroelectric current of the pre-poled [111]-oriented 0.955 Pb（Zn1/3Nb2/3） O3-0.045 PbTiO3 （PZN-4.5%PT） single crystals can shed some light on the phase transition and spontaneous polarization characters of this material in a similar way to measures of remanent polarization and dielectric properties. The pyroelectric current is measured and the corresponding spontaneous polarization is calculated as a function of temperature with various poling fields added during cooling the sample from 200℃ to room temperature. Critical electric field of 0.061 k V/cm is found to be essential to induce the intermediate ferroelectric orthorhombic phase between the ferroelectric rhombohedral and tetragonal phases. Below the critical field, the polarization increases almost linearly with the increase of poling field. At the critical field, the polarization at 30OC increases abruptly from 14μC/cm^2 for a poling field of O.06kV/cm to 29.5μC/cm^2 for a poling field of 0.061 kV/cm, and afterwards, increases slowly and saturates to 31 μC/cm^2 for poling fields beyond 0.55 kV/cm.     

Tunable strain effect on the charge/orbital ordering state in electron-doped La0.9Hf0.1MnO3 films

The impact of the lattice strain on the charge/orbital ordering state was studied by using a heterostructure composed with electron-doped La 0.9 Hf 0.1 MnO 3(LHMO) and ferro-and piezoelectric 0.67Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3-0.33PbTiO3.The ferroelectric poling induces a significant reduction in the biaxial tensile strain in the LHMO film,leading to a decrease in the film resistance over the whole temperature range and an increase in the insulator to metal transition temperature T IM.The resistance of LHMO film exhibits different responses to the external electric fields and lattice deformation,which is attributed to the coactions of converse piezoelectric effect and ferroelectric polarity effect.The modification of charge/orbital ordering phase by the electric fields and ferroelectric polarization suggests that the unstable states in the manganites are sensitive to strain effects.     

Development of a ferroelectric cathode diode

As a promising kind of high current cold cathode, the Ferroelectric Cathode （FEC） has several significant advantages, such as a controllable trigger time, lower vacuum requirement and large emitting area fabricability. The emitting current density of the FEC fabricated at Tsinghua University was more than 200 A/cm^2. In order to make the ferroelectric cathode into practical applications, a high current density diode using a ferroelectric cathode was designed, based on the PIC simulation. The performance of the FEC diode was investigated experimentally. When the applied diode voltage was 60 kV, a current density of more than 250 A/cm^2 was obtained, and the current density distribution was also measured.     

The interface density dependence of the electrical properties of 0.9Pb(Sc_(0.5)Ta_(0.5))O_3–0.1PbTiO_3/0.55Pb(Sc_(0.5)Ta_(0.5))O_3–0.45PbTiO_3 multilayer thin films

The 0.9Pb(Sc0.5Ta0.5)O3–0.1PbTiO3/0.55Pb(Sc0.5Ta0.5)O3–0.45 PbTiO3 multilayer thin films((PSTT10/45)n, n = 1–6, 10) are deposited on SiO2/Si(100) substrates by radio frequency magnetron sputtering technique with La Ni O3 buffer and electrode layer, and the films are subsequently annealed by a two-step rapid thermal approach. It is found that the interfacial density of the film has an important influence on the electric property of the film. The electric property of the film increases and reaches its critical point with the increase of interface density, and then decreases with the further increase of the interface density. With an interfacial density of 16 μm-1, the film shows an optimized dielectric property(high dielectric constant, εr = 765, lowest dielectric loss, tan δ = 0.041, at 1 k Hz) and ferroelectric property(highest remnant polarization,2Pr = 36.9 μC/cm2, low coercive field, 2Ec = 71.9 k V/cm). The possible reason for the electric behavior of the film is the competition of the interface stress with the interface defect.     

Numerical Calculation of SAW Propagation Properties at the x-Cut of Ferroelectric PMN-33%PT Single Crystals

Surface acoustic wave （SAW） properties at the x-cut of relaxor-based 0.67Pb（Mg1/3Nb2/3）O3-0.33PbTiO3 （PMN- 33%PT） ferroelectric single crystals are analyzed theoretically when poled along the [001]c cubic direction. It can be found that PMN-33%PT single crystal is a kind of material with a low phase velocity and high electromechanical coupling coefficient, and the single crystal possesses some cuts with zero power flow angle. The results are based on the material parameters at room temperature. The conclusions provide device designers with a few ideal cuts of PMN-33%PT single crystals. Moreover, choosing an optimal cut will dramatically improve the performance of SAW devices, and corresponding results for crystal systems working at other temperatures could also be figured out by employing the method.     

Au/Pt/InGaN/GaN Heterostructure Schottky Prototype Solar Cell

A patterned Au/Pt/In0.2Ga0.8N/GaN heterostructure Sehottky prototype solar cell is fabricated. The forward current-voltage characteristics indicate that thermionie emission is a dominant current transport mechanism at the Pt/InGaN interface in our fabricated cell. The Sehottky solar cell has an open-circuit voltage of 0.91 V, short-circuit current density of 7mA/cm^2, and fill factor of 0.45 when illuminated by a Xe lamp with a power density of 300 mW/cm^2. It exhibits a higher short-circuit current density of 30 mA/cm^2 and an external quantum efficiency of over 25% when illuminated by a 20-roW-power He-Cd laser.     

Influence of interface within the composite barrier on the tunneling electroresistance of ferroelectric tunnel junctions with symmetric electrodes

The interface with a pinned dipole within the composite barrier in a ferroelectric tunnel junction（FTJ） with symmetric electrodes is investigated.Different from the detrimental effect of the interface between the electrode and barrier in previous studies,the existence of an interface between the dielectric SrTiO₃ slab and ferroelectric BaTiO₃ slab in FTJs will enhance the tunneling electroresistance（TER） effect.Specifically,the interface with a lower dielectric constant and larger polarization pointing to the ferroelectric slab favors the increase of TER ratio.Therefore,interface control of high performance FTJ can be achieved.     

Low-Voltage Depletion-Mode Indium-Tin-Oxide Thin-Film Transistors Gated by Ba0.4Sr0.6TiO3 Dielectric

We report on the fabrication and characterization of low-voltage indium-tin-oxide （ITO） thin-film transistors （TFTs） gated by a0.4Sr0.6TiO3 （BST） gate dielectric deposited at room temperature. The 400-nm-thick BST film shows a low leakage current density of 6 × 10^-8 A/cm^2 and a high specific capacitance of 83 nF/cm^2 （corresponding εr= 37）. The ITO TFTs gated by such BST dielectric operate in a depletion mode with an operation voltage of 5.0 V. The device exhibits a threshold voltage of -3.7 V, a subthreshold swing of 0.5 V/decade, a field effect mobility of 3.2cm^2/Vs and a current on/off ratio of 1.4× 10^4.     

Preparation and Ferroelectric Properties of Double-Scale PZT Composite Piezoelectric Thick Film

Dense and crack-free double-scale lead zirconate titanate （Pb（Zr0.52 Ti0.48 ）O3, PZT） composite piezoelectric thick films have been successfully fabricated on Au/Cr/SiO2/Si substrates by a modified sol-gel method. The XRD analysis indicates that the thick film possesses a single-phase perovskite-type structure. The SEM micrograph shows that the surface is crack-free and the cross section is dense and dear. The thickness of the PZT thick film is about 4 μm. It also exhibits good ferroelectric properties, and has high direct current compression resistant properties. At the test frequency of 1 kHz, the film has the coercive field of 50 kV/cm, the saturation polarization of 54μC/cm^2 and the remnant polarization of 30 μC/cm^2.     

A simple and accurate method for measuring program/erase speed in a memory capacitor structure

With the merits of a simple process and a short fabrication period, the capacitor structure provides a convenient way to evaluate memory characteristics of charge trap memory devices. However, the slow minority carrier generation in a capacitor often makes an underestimation of the program/erase speed. In this paper, illumination around a memory capacitor is proposed to enhance the generation of minority carriers so that an accurate measurement of the program/erase speed can be achieved. From the dependence of the inversion capacitance on frequency, a time constant is extracted to quantitatively characterize the formation of the inversion layer. Experimental results show that under a high enough illumination, this time constant is greatly reduced and the measured minority carrier-related program/erase speed is in agreement with the reported value in a transistor structure.     

Combined effect of the transition layer and interfacial coupling on the properties of ferroelectric bilayer film

Within the framework of modified Ginzburg--Landau--Devonshire phenomenological theory, a ferroelectric bilayer film with a transition layer within each constituent film and an interfacial coupling between two materials has been studied. Properties including the Curie temperature and the spontaneous polarization of a bilayer film composed of two equally thick ferroelectric constituent films are discussed. The results show that the combined effect of the transition layer and the interfacial coupling plays an important role in explaining the interesting behaviour of ferroelectric multilayer structures consisting of two ferroelectric materials.     

Fabrication Process of Sol-Gel Spin Coating for SrBi2Ta2O9 Films Applied to FeRAM

We investigate SrBi2 Ta2 O9 （SBT） films prepared by the sol-gel spin method with different spin rates or different anneal conditions for the first layer of SBT, as promising ferroelectric layer materials applied to ferroelectric random access memory （FeRAM）. All the specimens in this experiment have similar SBT crystal orientations of （115）, （020）, （220）, and （135）. The Pt/SBT/Pt capacitor with coating of 3000rpm spin rate has a perfect rectangle shape of hysteresis loops, remanent polarization of 7.571μC/cm^2 and coercive voltage of 0.816 V at 5 V voltage amplitude. These characteristics are better than those with coating of 3500rpm spin rate, which is attributed to the influence for thickness and grain size of the film from depressed spin rate. Slow-rate anneal in the furnace for the first layer of SBT can improve the crystallization processes and properties for SBT layers slightly, compared with rapid thermal annealing. The ion damage from etching for the top electrode can influence leakage current characteristics of the Pt/SBT/Pt capacitor at positive voltage bias.     

Polarized Micro-Raman Study of the Temperature-Induced Phase Transition In 0.67 Pb（Mg1/3Nb2/3）O3-0.33PbTiO3

Polarized Raman spectra of ferroelectric relaxor 0.67Pb（Mg1/3Nb2/3）O3-0.33PbTiO3 （0.67PMN-0.33PT） single crystal are systematically investigated in a wide temperature range from -196 to 600℃ by micro-Raman scattering technique. The results clearly reveal that there are two structural phase transitions in such composite ferroelectric relaxor： the rhombohedral-tetragonal （R- T） phase transition and the tetragonal-cubic （T- C） phase transition. The former occurs at about TR-T =34℃, corresponding to the vanishing of the soft A1 mode at 106cm^-1 recorded in the parallel polarization. The latter appears at about TT-C = 144℃, which can be verified with the vanishing of mode at 780cm^-1 measured in the crossed polarization.     

Dielectric and ferroelectric properties of Sr_4CaSmTi_3Nb_7O_(30) with tetragonal tungsten bronze structure

Sr4CaSmTi3Nb7O30ceramics are synthesized and indexed as tetragonal tungsten bronze structure. The dielectric behavior and ferroelectric nature are investigated. Three dielectric anomalies are observed. The phase transition is a displacive phase transition with some diffusive characteristics, which indicates possible compositional variations within the materials on the microscopic scale. The weak distortion disappears in cooling process for differential scanning calorimetry measurement, and the large depression of Curie–Weiss temperature T0 indicates the difficulty in forming macroferroelectric domain. The ferroelectric nature in these filled tungsten bronze niobates originates from the off-center displacement of Bsite cations, but they are primarily dominated by A-site cation occupation. Both the radius and the valence of A1-site cations play an important role on ferroelectric properties of the filled tungsten bronze compounds. Existence of spontaneous polarization with a remanent polarization of 0.16 μC/cm2 a coercive field of Ec = 11.74 kV/cm confirms the room-temperature ferroelectric nature of Sr4CaSmTi3Nb7O30 ceramics.     

Effects of A1 site occupation on dielectric and ferroelectric properties of Sr4CaRTi3Nb7O30（R=Ce,Eu） tungsten bronze ceramics

Sr4Ca RTi3Nb7O30（R = Ce, Eu） tungsten bronze ceramics are prepared by a standard solid state reaction method. The effects of A1 site occupation on the dielectric and ferroelectric properties of Sr4 Ca RTi3Nb7O30（R = Ce, Eu） tetragonal tungsten bronzes are investigated. The Sr4 Ca Ce Ti3Nb7O30 shows a normal transition behavior due to the closer size ion occupation in A1 sites, which could suppress the distortion of B2 octahedra effectively. Sr4 Ca Eu Ti3Nb7O30 ceramic exhibits two dielectric anomalies, which might be related to the fact that the large radius difference between Ca^2＋ and Eu^3＋ could lead to the uneven distribution of Ca^2＋ and Eu^3＋ in A1 sites and form two slightly different kinds of compositions with different transition temperatures in the structure. Our results indicate that the ionic radius difference in A1 sites plays an important role in determining the dielectric and ferroelectric natures of the filled tungsten bronze ceramics. Polarization–electric field（P–E） curves are evaluated at room temperature and both of them show hysteresis loops. Sr4 Ca Ce Ti3Nb7O30 shows a fat hysteresis loop, indicating the long-range ferroelectric order in the ceramic. The current density–electric field（J–E） curves are measured at room temperature with a largest leakage current density of ～ 10^-6A/cm^2, indicating that their leakage currents are rather low.     

Oxidation of silicon surface with atomic oxygen radical anions

The surface oxidation of silicon （Si） wafers by atomic oxygen radical anions （O- anions） and the preparation of metal-oxide-semiconductor （MOS） capacitors on the O-oxidized Si substrates have been examined for the first time. The O- anions are generated from a recently developed O- storage-emission material of [Ca24Al2sO64]^4＋·4O^- （Cl2A7-O^- for short）. After it has been irradiated by an O- anion bean： （0.5 μA/cm^2） at 300℃ for 1-10 hours, the Si wafer achieves an oxide layer with a thickness ranging from 8 to 32 nm. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy （XPS） results reveal that the oxide layer is of a mixture of SiO2, Si2 O3, and Si2O distributed in different oxidation depths. The features of the MOS capacitor of 〈Al electrode/SiOx/Si〉 are investigated by measuring capacitance-voltage （C - V） and current-voltage （I - V） curves. The oxide charge density is about 6.0 × 10^1 cm^-2 derived from the （C - V curves. The leakage current density is in the order of 10^-6 A/cm^2 below 4 MV/cm, obtained from the I - V curves. The O- anions formed by present method would have potential applications to the oxidation and the surface-modification of materials together with the preparation of semiconductor devices.     

Organic Light-Emitting Diodes Driven by Organic Transistors

Organic thin-film field-effect transistors (OTFTs) with pentacene as the semiconductor have been fabricated for driving an organic light-emitting diode (OLED). The driving circuit includes two OTFTs and one storage capacitor. The field-effect mobility of the transistors in the driving circuit is more than 0.3cm^2/Vs, and the     

Effect of HTS Superconductors on Homogeneity of Measurement Field in Low Field Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Detection

In recent years, superconducting quantum interference devices （SQUIDs） have been demonstrated to be useful in the low field nuclear magnetic resonance （NMR） measurements. The high temperature superconducting （HTS） SQUID used in our experiments has a frequency-independent sensitivity of 40-50fT/Hz^1/2. When a liquid nitrogen cooled LC circuit is employed to form a tuned circuit with the SQUID, the sensitivity of the system can be further enhanced. The LC circuit consists of a capacitor and a coil made of copper wire or HTS tape, which is inductively coupled to the SQUID. However, the homogeneity of the measurement field deteriorates because of the HTS tape coil in the proximity of the sample. In contrast, the thin film SQUID with a washer area of 1 cm^2 has no effect on the NMR signal. Therefore, the impairment of the measurement field homogeneity in the case of different superconducting elements nearby is discussed by examining the free induction decay signals at 9 kHz. It is found that a square superconducting film with an area of i cm^2 may compensate for the inhomogeneity of the measurement field after the adjustment of its position.     

Dielectric and Ferroelectric Properties of La-Doped SrBi2Nb2O9 Ceramics

Sr1-xLa2x/3Bi2Nb20O （0 ≤ x ≤0.2） ceramic samples are prepared by the solid-state reaction method. Their structure, dielectric and ferroelectric properties are investigated. The incorporation of La^3＋ improves the den- sification and decreases the grain size of the ceramics without changing the crystal structure. The remanent polarization 2PT increases with increasing La content and reaches a maximum value of 22.8μC/cm^2 at x = 0.125, which is approximately 60% larger than that of pure SrBi2Nb2O9. The Curie temperature keeps almost unchanged at a value of about 440℃. The relationship between doping and the ferroeleetrie and dielectric properties are discussed.     

Multiferroicity in B-site ordered double perovskite Y2MnCrO6

Double perovskite manganite Y2MnCrO6 ceramic Novel multiferroic properties are displayed with respect is synthesized and its multiferroic properties are investigated. to other multiferroics, such as high ferroelectric phase transi- tion temperature, and the coexistence of ferrimagnetism and ferroelectricity. Moreover, the ferroelectric polarization of Y2MnCrO6 below the magnetic phase temperature can be effectively tuned by an external magnetic field, showing a re- markable magnetoelectric effect. These results open an effective avenue to explore magnetic multiferroics with spontaneous magnetization and ferroelectricity, as well as a high ferroelectric transition temperature.