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| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Preprint |
| Published: |
2025
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.18920 |
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| _version_ | 1866914306330722304 |
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| author | Afroze, Nashrah Fahrvandi, Hamoon Ren, Guodong Kumar, Pawan Nelson, Christopher Lombardo, Sarah Tian, Mengkun Lee, Ping-Che Chen, Jiayi Noor, Manifa Chae, Kisung Kang, Sanghyun Ravindran, Prasanna Venkat Bergschneider, Matthew Jung, Gwan Yeong Omprakash, Pravan Ligonde, Gardy K. Tasneem, Nujhat Triyoso, Dina Consiglio, Steven Tapily, Kanda Clark, Robert Leusink, Gert Ravichandran, Jayakanth Yu, Shimeng Lupini, Andrew Kummel, Andrew Cho, Kyeongjae Choe, Duk-Hyun Bassiri-Gharb, Nazanin Kacher, Josh Mishra, Rohan Lee, Jun Hee Khan, Asif |
| author_facet | Afroze, Nashrah Fahrvandi, Hamoon Ren, Guodong Kumar, Pawan Nelson, Christopher Lombardo, Sarah Tian, Mengkun Lee, Ping-Che Chen, Jiayi Noor, Manifa Chae, Kisung Kang, Sanghyun Ravindran, Prasanna Venkat Bergschneider, Matthew Jung, Gwan Yeong Omprakash, Pravan Ligonde, Gardy K. Tasneem, Nujhat Triyoso, Dina Consiglio, Steven Tapily, Kanda Clark, Robert Leusink, Gert Ravichandran, Jayakanth Yu, Shimeng Lupini, Andrew Kummel, Andrew Cho, Kyeongjae Choe, Duk-Hyun Bassiri-Gharb, Nazanin Kacher, Josh Mishra, Rohan Lee, Jun Hee Khan, Asif |
| contents | Flat phonon bands in fluorite ferroelectrics (HfO2 or ZrO2) shrink polar domains laterally to an irreducible half-unit-cell width (0.27 nm) within which the vertical arrangement of dipoles is expected to remain uniform. We report on the direct observation of nonuniform and nearly discrete vertical arrangements of dipoles in ZrO2 thin films consisting of closely spaced head-to-head (HH) and tail-to-tail (TT) charged 180 degree walls, each exhibiting a distinct bulk-like structure. These charged domain walls (CDWs) further compress the irreducibly narrow, laterally stacked domains vertically to a thickness of 1-2.75 nm, yielding in-plane domains with sub-nm2 footprints-among the smallest ever reported for any ferroelectric material. The HH and TT walls form due to their flat longitudinal optical (LO) polar bands and are electrostatically stabilized by bound-charge compensation via interstitial oxygen atoms, which act as natural structural defects at the HH walls. Moreover, these walls are predicted to be conducting and to exhibit ultralow propagation barriers, with HH walls (1.6 meV) being far more mobile than TT walls (22.3 meV), indicating strong potential for low-voltage, domain-wall-based nanoelectronics. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2507_18920 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Sub-nm2 ferroelectric domains via charged 180 degree walls in ZrO2 Afroze, Nashrah Fahrvandi, Hamoon Ren, Guodong Kumar, Pawan Nelson, Christopher Lombardo, Sarah Tian, Mengkun Lee, Ping-Che Chen, Jiayi Noor, Manifa Chae, Kisung Kang, Sanghyun Ravindran, Prasanna Venkat Bergschneider, Matthew Jung, Gwan Yeong Omprakash, Pravan Ligonde, Gardy K. Tasneem, Nujhat Triyoso, Dina Consiglio, Steven Tapily, Kanda Clark, Robert Leusink, Gert Ravichandran, Jayakanth Yu, Shimeng Lupini, Andrew Kummel, Andrew Cho, Kyeongjae Choe, Duk-Hyun Bassiri-Gharb, Nazanin Kacher, Josh Mishra, Rohan Lee, Jun Hee Khan, Asif Materials Science Flat phonon bands in fluorite ferroelectrics (HfO2 or ZrO2) shrink polar domains laterally to an irreducible half-unit-cell width (0.27 nm) within which the vertical arrangement of dipoles is expected to remain uniform. We report on the direct observation of nonuniform and nearly discrete vertical arrangements of dipoles in ZrO2 thin films consisting of closely spaced head-to-head (HH) and tail-to-tail (TT) charged 180 degree walls, each exhibiting a distinct bulk-like structure. These charged domain walls (CDWs) further compress the irreducibly narrow, laterally stacked domains vertically to a thickness of 1-2.75 nm, yielding in-plane domains with sub-nm2 footprints-among the smallest ever reported for any ferroelectric material. The HH and TT walls form due to their flat longitudinal optical (LO) polar bands and are electrostatically stabilized by bound-charge compensation via interstitial oxygen atoms, which act as natural structural defects at the HH walls. Moreover, these walls are predicted to be conducting and to exhibit ultralow propagation barriers, with HH walls (1.6 meV) being far more mobile than TT walls (22.3 meV), indicating strong potential for low-voltage, domain-wall-based nanoelectronics. |
| title | Sub-nm2 ferroelectric domains via charged 180 degree walls in ZrO2 |
| topic | Materials Science |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.18920 |