Polarization Switching Dynamics Governed by the Thermodynamic Nucleation Process in Ultrathin Ferroelectric Films

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J. Y. Jo,¹ D. J. Kim,¹ Y. S. Kim,¹ S.-B. Choe,¹ T. K. Song,² J.-G. Yoon,³ and T. W. Noh¹
¹FPRD, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Seoul National University, Seoul 151-747, Korea
²School of Nano Advanced Materials, Changwon National University, Changwon, Gyeongnam 641-773, Korea
³Department of Physics, University of Suwon, Suwon, Gyeonggi-do 445-743, Korea

Received 3 May 2006; published 15 December 2006

Inmost ferroelectrics, the domain nucleation barrier (U^*) is thermally insurmountable;this is called “Landauer's paradox.” However, we showed that, inultrathin films, the large depolarization fields could lower U^* toa level comparable to thermal energy (k_BT), resulting in power-lawdecay of polarization. We empirically found a universal relation betweenthe power-law decay exponent and U^*/k_BT. This relation will providea practical but fundamental limit for capacitor-type ferroelectric devices, analogousto the superparamagnetic limit for magnetic memory devices.

URL:	http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.97.247602
DOI:	10.1103/PhysRevLett.97.247602
PACS:	77.22.Ej; 77.80.Dj; 77.80.Fm; 85.50.-n 77.22.Ej Dielectric polarization and depolarization 77.80.Dj Ferroelectric domain structure; hysteresis 77.80.Fm Ferroelectric switching phenomena 85.50.-n Dielectric, ferroelectric, and piezoelectric devices YEAR: 2006