Avalanche breakdown and self-stabilization effects in electrically driven transition of carbon nanotube covered VO2 film

Abstract

Electrical-driven metal–insulator transition (MIT) is quite vital and widespread for both applications and MIT mechanism of VO2. In this report, we discussed the avalanche breakdown and self-stabilization effects behind the electrically driven phase transition in macro-scale carbon nanotube covered VO2 film to further understand the phase transition behaviors as well as explore promising electrical-driven VO2 devices. It was found that the Joule heat was the main source to trigger the phase transition of VO2 film. However, the time-dependent triggering routes were quite different, since the avalanche behavior was observed under the voltage-driven mode, while the gradual self-stabilization existed in the current-driven mode. The simulation results based on the proposed thermodynamics models were in good agreement with the experimental phenomena, which were basically originated from the intrinsic first-order phase transition properties of VO2 film.