Stationary domain wall contribution to enhanced ferroelectric susceptibility

In ferroelectrics, the effect of domain wall motion on properties has been widely studied, but non-motional or stationary contributions from the volume of material within the domain wall itself has received less attention. Here we report the measurement of stationary domain wall contributions to permittivity in PbZr 0.2 Ti 0.8 O 3 films. Studies of (001)-, (101)- and (111)-oriented epitaxial films reveal that (111)-oriented films, in which the motional domain wall contributions are frozen out, exhibit permittivity values approximately three times larger than the intrinsic response alone. This discrepancy can only be accounted for by considering a stationary contribution from the domain wall volume of the material that is 6–78 times larger than the bulk response, and is consistent with predictions of the enhancement of susceptibilities within 90° domain walls. This work offers new insights into the microscopic origin of dielectric enhancement and provides a pathway to engineer the dielectric response of materials. The motion of ferroelectric domain walls is critical in determining the response of ferroelectrics to an applied stimulus. Here, the authors directly measure the effect of an additional non-motional or stationary domain wall contribution to dielectric susceptibility in nanodomain ferroelectric films.