ScienceDaily (July 10, 2012) — Promising news for those who relish the prospects of a one-inch chip storing multiple terabytes of data, some clarity has been brought to the here-to-fore confusing physics of ferroelectric nanomaterials. A multi-institutional team of researchers, led by scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has provided the first atomic-scale insights into the ferroelectric properties of nanocrystals. This information will be critical for development of the next generation of nonvolatile data storage devices.
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Working with the world's most powerful transmission electron microscope, the researchers mapped the ferroelectric structural distortions in nanocrystals of germanium telluride, a semiconductor, and barium titanate, an insulator. This data was then combined with data from electron holographic polarization imaging to yield detailed information on the polarization structures and scaling limits of ferroelectric order on the nanoscale.
"As we scale down our device technology from the microscale to the nanoscale, we need a better understanding of how critical material properties, such as ferroelectric behavior, are impacted," says Paul Alivisatos, director of Berkeley Lab and one of the principal investigators in this research. "Our results provide a pathway to unraveling the fundamental physics of nanoscale ferroelectricity at the smallest possible size scales."
Alivisatos, who is also the Larry and Diane Bock Professor of Nanotechnology at the University of California (UC) Berkeley, is a corresponding author of a paper describing this work in the journal Nature Materials titled "Ferroelectric order in individual nanometrescale Crystals." The other corresponding author is Ramamoorthy Ramesh, a senior scientist with Berkeley Lab's Materials Sciences Division and the Plato Malozemoff Professor of Materials Science and Physics for UC Berkeley.
Ferroelectricity is the property by which materials can be electrically polarized, meaning they will be oriented in favor of either a positive or negative electrical charge. This polarization can be flipped with the application of an external electrical field, a property that could be exploited for nonvolatile data storage, similar to the use of ferromagnetic materials today but using much smaller, far more densely packed devices.
"Although much progress has been made towards understanding nanoscale photophysical magnetic and other functional properties, understanding the basic physics of ferroelectric nanomaterials remains far less advanced," says co-principal investigator Ramesh, who attributes contradicting reports on nanoscale ferroelectricity in part to the lack of high-quality, nanocrystals of ferroelectric materials that feature well-defined sizes, shapes and surfaces.
"Another problem has been the reliance on ensemble measurements rather than single particle techniques," he says. "Statistical-average measurement techniques tend to obscure the physical mechanisms responsible for profound changes in ferroelectric behavior within individual nanocrystals."
The Berkeley Lab-led research team was able to map ferroelectric structural distortions within individual nanocrystals thanks to the unprecedented capabilities of TEAM I, which is housed at Berkeley Lab's National Center for Electron Microscopy (NCEM). TEAM stands for "Transmission Electron Aberration-corrected Microscope." TEAM I can resolve images of structures with dimensions as small as one half
See Also:
Working with the world's most powerful transmission electron microscope, the researchers mapped the ferroelectric structural distortions in nanocrystals of germanium telluride, a semiconductor, and barium titanate, an insulator. This data was then combined with data from electron holographic polarization imaging to yield detailed information on the polarization structures and scaling limits of ferroelectric order on the nanoscale.
"As we scale down our device technology from the microscale to the nanoscale, we need a better understanding of how critical material properties, such as ferroelectric behavior, are impacted," says Paul Alivisatos, director of Berkeley Lab and one of the principal investigators in this research. "Our results provide a pathway to unraveling the fundamental physics of nanoscale ferroelectricity at the smallest possible size scales."
Alivisatos, who is also the Larry and Diane Bock Professor of Nanotechnology at the University of California (UC) Berkeley, is a corresponding author of a paper describing this work in the journal Nature Materials titled "Ferroelectric order in individual nanometrescale Crystals." The other corresponding author is Ramamoorthy Ramesh, a senior scientist with Berkeley Lab's Materials Sciences Division and the Plato Malozemoff Professor of Materials Science and Physics for UC Berkeley.
Ferroelectricity is the property by which materials can be electrically polarized, meaning they will be oriented in favor of either a positive or negative electrical charge. This polarization can be flipped with the application of an external electrical field, a property that could be exploited for nonvolatile data storage, similar to the use of ferromagnetic materials today but using much smaller, far more densely packed devices.
"Although much progress has been made towards understanding nanoscale photophysical magnetic and other functional properties, understanding the basic physics of ferroelectric nanomaterials remains far less advanced," says co-principal investigator Ramesh, who attributes contradicting reports on nanoscale ferroelectricity in part to the lack of high-quality, nanocrystals of ferroelectric materials that feature well-defined sizes, shapes and surfaces.
"Another problem has been the reliance on ensemble measurements rather than single particle techniques," he says. "Statistical-average measurement techniques tend to obscure the physical mechanisms responsible for profound changes in ferroelectric behavior within individual nanocrystals."
The Berkeley Lab-led research team was able to map ferroelectric structural distortions within individual nanocrystals thanks to the unprecedented capabilities of TEAM I, which is housed at Berkeley Lab's National Center for Electron Microscopy (NCEM). TEAM stands for "Transmission Electron Aberration-corrected Microscope." TEAM I can resolve images of structures with dimensions as small as one half