Electric-field–temperature phase diagram of the relaxor ferroelectric lanthanum-modified lead zirconate titanate

Abstract

Transition lines between various phases in the electric-field--temperature phase diagram of 9/65/35 lanthanum-modified lead zirconate titanate ceramics were determined by measurements of the temperature and electric-field-dependent dielectric constant. Above a critical field ${(E}_{C})$ the dc bias electric field induces a transition from the relaxor (R) to the long-range ferroelectric (FE) phase. In the temperature direction of the approach to the FE phase the R-FE transition line was determined from the field-cooled--field-heated dielectric susceptibilities, while depolarization temperatures were obtained from the field-cooled--zero-field-heated dielectric susceptibilities. A considerably large shift was found for the above two R-FE transition lines demonstrating the strong impact of the electric field on the stability of the FE phase with increasing temperature. It was found that below ${E}_{C}$ ergodicity is broken due to the divergence of the longest relaxation time at the freezing temperature ${T}_{0}=259 \mathrm{K}.$ Hence the system exhibits a transition line between the ergodic (ER) and nonergodic (NR) relaxor state. In the dc bias field direction of the approach to the FE phase, the temperature dependence of ${E}_{C},$ i.e., the transition lines between ER or NR and FE phases were studied by measurements of the complex dielectric constant as a function of a dc bias field at several fixed temperatures. The experimental results are compared with the results of a spherical random bond-random field model of relaxor ferroelectrics.