Simultaneous dynamic characterization of charge and structural motion during ferroelectric switching

Monitoring structural changes in ferroelectric thin films during electric field-induced polarization switching is important for a full microscopic understanding of the coupled motion of charges, atoms and domain walls. We combine standard ferroelectric test-cycles with time-resolved x-ray diffraction to investigate the response of a nanoscale ferroelectric oxide capacitor upon charging, discharging and switching. Piezoelectric strain develops during the electronic RC time constant and additionally during structural domain-wall creep. The complex atomic motion during ferroelectric polarization reversal starts with a negative piezoelectric response to the charge flow triggered by voltage pulses. Incomplete screening limits the compressive strain. The piezoelectric modulation of the unit cell tweaks the energy barrier between the two polarization states. Domain wall motion is evidenced by a broadening of the in-plane components of Bragg reflections. Such simultaneous measurements on a working device elucidate and visualize the complex interplay of charge flow and structural motion and challenges theoretical modelling

Sub-band level-assisted photoconduction in epitaxial BiFeO3 films

Sub-band level assisted conduction mechanisms are well known in the field of semiconducting materials. In this work, we explicitly show the validity of such a mechanism in the multiferrroic material BiFeO3 (BFO). Our study is based on two different systems of epitaxial thin films of BFO, relaxed and strained. By analyzing the spectral distribution of the photoresponse from both the systems, the role of the sub-band levels in the photoconductive phenomena becomes evident. Additionally, the influence of epitaxial strain on the trapping activity of these levels is also observed. A model is proposed by taking into account the reversal of the role of a sub-band gap level, i.e., from a trapping to a ground state

Strain-gradient mediated local conduction in strained bismuth ferrite films

It has been recently shown that the strain gradient is able to separate the light-excited electron-hole pairs in semiconductors, but how it affects the photoelectric properties of the photo-active materials remains an open question. Here, we demonstrate the critical role of the strain gradient in mediating local photoelectric properties in the strained BiFeO3 thin films by systematically characterizing the local conduction with nanometre lateral resolution in both dark and illuminated conditions. Due to the giant strain gradient manifested at the morphotropic phase boundaries, the associated flexo-photovoltaic effect induces on one side an enhanced photoconduction in the R-phase, and on the other side a negative photoconductivity in the morphotropic [Formula: see text]-phase. This work offers insight and implication of the strain gradient on the electronic properties in both optoelectronic and photovoltaic devices

CLIMATE AND WEATHER INFLUENCE OVER THE TOURIST SECTOR IN THE LAND OF DORNA

The Land of Dorna represents a region with a climate specific to intermountain depressions and mountain areas by its geographic position, the characteristics of active subjacent surfaces and of dominant air-masses,. Climatic factors and phenomena play an important part in outlining the whole features of the territorial system and development of some particular tourist activities in this geographic region. The Land of Dorna has a lot of natural and anthropic resources that have taken many different shapes under the influence of some internal and external elements over the time. Therefore, our main goal is to identify and analyze the way in which climate and weather work on tourist activities in this part of the country

Artefacts in geometric phase analysis of compound materials

The geometric phase analysis (GPA) algorithm is known as a robust and straightforward technique that can be used to measure lattice strains in high resolution transmission electron microscope (TEM) images. It is also attractive for analysis of aberration-corrected scanning TEM (ac-STEM) images that resolve every atom column, since it uses Fourier transforms and does not require real-space peak detection and assignment to appropriate sublattices. Here it is demonstrated that in ac-STEM images of compound materials (i.e. with more than one atom per unit cell) an additional phase is present in the Fourier transform. If the structure changes from one area to another in the image (e.g. across an interface), the change in this additional phase will appear as a strain in conventional GPA, even if there is no lattice strain. Strategies to avoid this pitfall are outlined.Comment: 9 pages, 7 figures, Preprint before review, submitted to Ultramicroscopy 7 April 201

Sensitive methods for estimating the anchoring strength of nematic liquid crystals on Langmuir-Blodgett monolayers of fatty acids

The anchoring of the nematic liquid crystal N-(p-methoxybenzylidene)-p-butylaniline (MBBA) on Langmuir-Blodgett monolayers of fatty acids (COOHC$_{n}$H$_{2n+1}$) was studied as a function of the length of the fatty acid alkyl chains, $n$ ($n = 15, 17, 19, 21$). The monolayers were deposited onto ITO-coated glass plates which were used to assemble sandwich cells of various thickness that were filled with MBBA in the nematic phase. The mechanism of relaxation from the flow-induced quasi-planar to the surface-induced homeotropic alignment was studied for the four decreases linearly with increasing the length of the alkyl chains $n$ which suggests that the Langmuir-Blodgett film plays a role in the phenomenon. This fact was confirmed by a sensitive estimation of the anchoring strength of MBBA on the fatty acid monolayers after anchoring breaking which takes place at the transition between two electric-field--induced turbulent states, denoted as DSM1 and DSM2. It was found that the threshold electric field for the anchoring breaking, which can be considered as a measure of the anchoring strength, also decreases linearly as $n$ increases. Both methods thus possess a high sensitivity in resolving small differences in anchoring strength. In cells coated with mixed Langmuir-Blodgett monolayers of two fatty acids ($n=15$ and $n=17$) a maximum of the relaxation speed was observed when the two acids were present in equal amount. This observation homeotropic cells by changing the ratio between the components of the surfactant film.Comment: LaTeX article, 20 pages, 15 figures, 17 EPS files. 1 figure added, references moved. Submitted to Phys. Rev.

A Diagram Is Worth A Dozen Images

Diagrams are common tools for representing complex concepts, relationships and events, often when it would be difficult to portray the same information with natural images. Understanding natural images has been extensively studied in computer vision, while diagram understanding has received little attention. In this paper, we study the problem of diagram interpretation and reasoning, the challenging task of identifying the structure of a diagram and the semantics of its constituents and their relationships. We introduce Diagram Parse Graphs (DPG) as our representation to model the structure of diagrams. We define syntactic parsing of diagrams as learning to infer DPGs for diagrams and study semantic interpretation and reasoning of diagrams in the context of diagram question answering. We devise an LSTM-based method for syntactic parsing of diagrams and introduce a DPG-based attention model for diagram question answering. We compile a new dataset of diagrams with exhaustive annotations of constituents and relationships for over 5,000 diagrams and 15,000 questions and answers. Our results show the significance of our models for syntactic parsing and question answering in diagrams using DPGs

Role of domain walls in the abnormal photovoltaic effect in BiFeO3

Recently, the anomalous photovoltaic (PV) effect in BiFeO3 (BFO) thin films, which resulted in open circuit voltages (V-oc) considerably larger than the band gap of the material, has generated a revival of the entire field of photoferroelectrics. Here, via temperature-dependent PV studies, we prove that the bulk photovoltaic (BPV) effect, which has been studied in the past for many non-centrosymmetric materials, is at the origin of the anomalous PV effect in BFO films. Moreover, we show that irrespective of the measurement geometry, V-oc as high as 50V can be achieved by controlling the conductivity of domain walls (DW). We also show that photoconductivity of the DW is markedly higher than in the bulk of BFO

Polarization curling and flux closures in multiferroic tunnel junctions

Formation of domain walls in ferroelectrics is not energetically favourable in low-dimensional systems. Instead, vortex-type structures are formed that are driven by depolarization fields occurring in such systems. Consequently, polarization vortices have only been experimentally found in systems in which these fields are deliberately maximized, that is, in films between insulating layers. As such configurations are devoid of screening charges provided by metal electrodes, commonly used in electronic devices, it is wise to investigate if curling polarization structures are innate to ferroelectricity or induced by the absence of electrodes. Here we show that in unpoled Co/PbTiO3/(La,Sr)MnO3 ferroelectric tunnel junctions, the polarization in active PbTiO3 layers 9 unit cells thick forms Kittel-like domains, while at 6 unit cells there is a complex flux-closure curling behaviour resembling an incommensurate phase. Reducing the thickness to 3 unit cells, there is an almost complete loss of switchable polarization associated with an internal gradient