# Influence of image forces on the electron transport in ferroelectric tunnel junctions

## TL;DR

This paper investigates how image forces affect electron transport in ferroelectric tunnel junctions, revealing their role in enhancing electro-resistance effects and causing temperature-dependent conductance variations.

## Contribution

It demonstrates the dual influence of image forces on conductance, including their impact on electro-resistance effects and temperature dependence in ferroelectric tunnel junctions.

## Key findings

- Image forces enhance electro-resistance due to polarization hysteresis.
- Image forces induce electro-resistance from dielectric permittivity hysteresis.
- Conductance varies strongly with temperature due to image forces.

## Abstract

We study influence of image forces on conductance of ferroelectric tunnel junctions. We show that the influence of image forces is twofold: i) they enhance the electro-resistance effect due to polarization hysteresis in symmetric tunnel junctions at non-zero bias and ii) they produce the electro-resistance effect due to hysteresis of dielectric permittivity of ferroelectric barrier. We study dependence of ferroelectric tunnel junction conductance on temperature and show that image forces lead to strong conductance variation with temperature.