Highly mobile vortex structures inside polar twin boundaries in SrTiO3

T Zykova-Timan and EKH Salje, APPLIED PHYSICS LETTERS, 104, 082907 (2014).

DOI: 10.1063/1.4866859

We present computer simulations of previously unknown polarization singularities (vortexes) inside polar SrTiO3 twin boundaries. Usually polarity in twin walls is ferri-electric, whereas vortex excitations lead to true ferroelectricity on a very local scale. As a result, in- plane electric fields can selectively stabilize one of the vortex polarization states and enhance the ability of the walls to move. This behavior can explain the well-known and uniquely high, mobility of twin boundaries in SrTiO3. For nanoscale ferroelectric memory devices, we envisage a precisely controllable device, where a desired domain wall pattern is manipulated by shifting the vortex position electrically. (C) 2014 Author(s). All article content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

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