Thin films of relaxor ferroelectric/antiferroelectric heterolayered structure for energy storage

Abstract

We report the energy-storage performance and electric breakdown field of antiferroelectric PbZrO3 (PZ) and relaxor ferroelectric Pb0.9La0.1(Zr0.52Ti0.48)O3 (PLZT) single films, as well as PLZT/PZ and PZ/PLZT heterolayered films grown on SrRuO3/Ca2Nb3O10–nanosheet/Si substrates using pulsed laser deposition. These films show the highly textured (001) orientation. The ‘square’ hysteresis loop with very sharp electric field–induced antiferroelectric–ferroelectric (AFE–FE) phase transition is observed for the PZ/Si film, meanwhile the heterolayerd PLZT/PZ/Si and PZ/PLZT/Si films show the ‘slanted’ hysteresis loops with gradual phase transition. Moreover, the electric field-induced AFE-FE phase transition in the hererolayered films is occurred at lower applied electric fields (~275 kV/cm) than that in the PZ/Si (~425 kV/cm), due to the presence of the PLZT layers in the heterolayered films. Owing to the dense structure in PLZT layer, the large electric breakdown strength of 2000 and 1825 kV/cm, and then the high recoverable energy-storage density of 28.8 and 23.8 J/cm3, respectively, are obtained for the PLZT/Si and PZ/PLZT/Si films.