Temperature-assisted Piezoresponse Force Microscopy: Probing Local Temperature-Induced Phase Transitions in Ferroics

TL;DR

This paper advances temperature-assisted piezoresponse force microscopy (tPFM) by analyzing its signal mechanisms, exploring thermal and bias effects in ferroelectrics, and establishing a framework for interpreting local temperature-induced phase transitions and related phenomena.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of the signal formation in tPFM, including thermal and bias effects, and introduces a framework for understanding temperature-induced polarization switching in ferroelectrics.

Findings

Thermal and bias-induced switching interplay in ferroelectrics.

Thermopolarization effects can be significant in soft ferroelectrics.

Framework for quantitative interpretation of tPFM observations.

Abstract

Combination of local heating and biasing at the tip-surface junction in temperature-assisted piezoresponse force microscopy (tPFM) opens the pathway for probing local temperature induced phase transitions in ferroics, exploring the temperature dependence of polarization dynamics in ferroelectrics, and potentially discovering coupled phenomena driven by strong temperature- and electric field gradients. Here, we analyze the signal formation mechanism in tPFM and explore the interplay between thermal- and bias-induced switching in model ferroelectric materials. We further explore the contributions of the flexoelectric and thermopolarization effects to the local electromechanical response, and demonstrate that the latter can be significant for "soft" ferroelectrics. These results establish the framework for quantitative interpretation of tPFM observations, predict the emergence the non-trivial switching and relaxation phenomena driven by non-local thermal gradient-induced polarization switching, and open a pathway for exploring the physics of thermopolarization effects in various non-centrosymmetric and centrosymmetric materials.