Polarization Switching Dynamics Governed by the Thermodynamic Nucleation Process

저자 : J.Y. Jo, D. J. Kim, Y. S. Kim, S.-B. Choe, T. K. Song, J.-G. Yoon, and T.W. Noh

초록 : In most ferroelectrics, the domain nucleation barrier (U*) is thermally insurmountable; this is called "Landauer's paradox." However, we showed that, in ultrathin films, the large depolarization fields could lower U* to a level comparable to thermal energy (kBT), resulting in power-law decay of polarization. We empirically found a universal relation between the power-law decay exponent and U*/kBT. This relation will provide a practical but fundamental limit for capacitor-type ferroelectric devices, analogous to the superparamagnetic limit for magnetic memory devices.

PRL 97, 247602