Molecular Ferroelectric with Most Equivalent Polarization Directions Induced by the Plastic Phase Transition.
Besides the single crystals, ferroelectric materials are actually widely used in the forms of the polycrystals like ceramics. Multiaxial ferroelectrics with multiple equivalent polarization directions are preferable for such applications, because more equivalent ferroelectric axes allow random spontaneous polarization vectors to be oriented along the electric field to achieve a larger polarization after poling. Most of ceramic ferroelectrics like BaTiO3have equivalent ferroelectric axes no more than three. We herein describe a molecular-ionic ferroelectric with 12 equivalent ferroelectric axes: tetraethylammonium perchlorate, whose number of axes is the most in the known ferroelectrics. Appearance of so many equivalent ferroelectric axes benefits from the plastic phase transition, because the plastic phase usually crystallizes in a highly symmetric cubic system. A perfect macroscopic ferroelectricity can be obtained on the polycrystalline film of this material. This finding opened an avenue constructing multiaxial ferroelectrics for applications as polycrystalline materials.
Ordered Matter Science Research Center, Southeast University , Nanjing 211189, People's Republic of China.
Heng-Yun
HY
Ye
Ordered Matter Science Research Center, Southeast University , Nanjing 211189, People's Republic of China.
Jia-Zhen
JZ
Ge
Ordered Matter Science Research Center, Southeast University , Nanjing 211189, People's Republic of China.
Yuan-Yuan
YY
Tang
Ordered Matter Science Research Center, Southeast University , Nanjing 211189, People's Republic of China.
Peng-Fei
PF
Li
Ordered Matter Science Research Center, Southeast University , Nanjing 211189, People's Republic of China.
Yi
Y
Zhang
Ordered Matter Science Research Center, Southeast University , Nanjing 211189, People's Republic of China.
Yu-Meng
YM
You
Ordered Matter Science Research Center, Southeast University , Nanjing 211189, People's Republic of China.
Ren-Gen
RG
Xiong