TEM has shown that the strongly piezoelectric material Pb(Zr0.52Ti0.48)O3 separates into two phases at low temperatures. The majority phase is the monoclinic phase previously found by x-ray diffraction. The minority phase, with a nanoscale coherence length, is a slightly distorted variant of the first resulting from the anti-phase rotation of the oxygen octahedra about [111]. This work clears up a recent controversy about the origin of superlattice peaks in these materials, and supports recent theoretical results predicting the coexistence of ferroelectric and rotational instabilities.
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0204512,
title = {Low temperature superlattice in monoclinic PZT},
author = {B. Noheda and L. Wu and Y. Zhu},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0204512},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
REVTeX4, 4 eps figures embedded. JPG version of figs. 2&4 is also included