Hierarchical domain structures in buckled ferroelectric free sheets
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: Flat elastic sheets tend to display wrinkles and folds. From pieces of clothing down to two-dimensional crystals, these corrugations appear in response to strain generated by sheet compression or stretching, thermal or mechanical mismatch with other elastic layers, or surface tension. Extensively studied in metals, polymers and, — more recently — in van der Waals exfoliated layers, with the advent of thin single crystal freestanding films of complex oxides , researchers are now paying attention to novel microstructural effects induced by bending ferroelectric-ferroelastics, where polarization is strongly coupled to lattice deformation. Here we show that wrinkle undulations in BaTiO 3 sheets bonded to a viscoelastic substrate transform into a buckle delamination geometry when transferred onto a rigid substrate. Using spatially resolved techniques at different scales (Raman, scanning probe and electron microscopy), we show how these delaminations in the free BaTiO 3 sheets display a self-organization of ferroelastic domains along the buckle profile that strongly differs from the more studied sinusoidal wrinkle geometry. Moreover, we disclose the hierarchical distribution of a secondary set of domains induced by the misalignment of these folding structures from the preferred in-plane crystallographic orientations . Our results disclose the relevance of the morphology and orientation of buckling instabilities in ferroelectric free sheets, for the stabilization of different domain structures, pointing to new routes for domain engineering of ferroelectrics in flexible oxide sheets.
Source: Acta Materialia
Institution: Universitat de Barcelona
Language: English
Subfield: Materials Chemistry
Field: Materials Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $3,700
Funders: U.S. Department of Energy, Centres de Recerca de Catalunya, Institut Català de Nanociència i Nanotecnologia, European Commission, Generalitat de Catalunya, Universidad de Zaragoza, Office of Science, European Regional Development Fund, Agencia Estatal de Investigación, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Awards: G1255325603, G1622782223, G2262748287, G234454427, G2799588417, G2906055632, G3005324705, G3025668325, G3480869486, G354764522, G3681454997, G4042783231, G425668148, G434337789, G451917667, G5417250019, G5955501538, G5967599077, G6326200580, G6605876378, G6656126374, G6762955466, G677611228, G7016589888, G7084143925, G7420629364, G7425137858, G7731791180, G8278680633, G842516163, G8684520763, G983705713
OpenAlex ID: W4409745124