441 research outputs found
Dielectric behavior of Copper Tantalum Oxide
A thorough investigation of the dielectric properties of Cu2Ta4O12, a
material crystallizing in a pseudo-cubic, perovskite-derived structure is
presented. We measured the dielectric constant and conductivity of single
crystals in an exceptionally broad frequency range up to GHz frequencies and at
temperatures from 25 - 500 K. The detected dielectric constant is unusually
high (reaching values up to 105) and almost constant in a broad frequency and
temperature range. Cu2Ta4O12 possesses a crystal structure similar to
CaCu3Ti4O12, the compound for which such an unusually high dielectric constant
was first observed. An analysis of the results using a simple equivalent
circuit and measurements with different types of contact revealed that
extrinsic interfacial polarization effects, derived from surface barrier
capacitors are the origin of the observed giant dielectric constants. The
intrinsic properties of Cu2Ta4O12 are characterized by a (still relatively
high) dielectric constant in the order of 100 and by charge transport via
hopping conduction of Anderson-localized charge carriers.Comment: 18 pages, 6 figures, submitted to Jouranl of Physical Chemestr
Evidence for power-law frequency dependence of intrinsic dielectric response in the CaCuTiO
We investigated the dielectric response of CaCuTiO (CCTO) thin
films grown epitaxially on LaAlO (001) substrates by Pulsed Laser
Deposition (PLD). The dielectric response of the films was found to be strongly
dominated by a power-law in frequency, typical of materials with localized
hopping charge carriers, in contrast to the Debye-like response of the bulk
material. The film conductivity decreases with annealing in oxygen, and it
suggests that oxygen deficit is a cause of the relatively high film
conductivity. With increase of the oxygen content, the room temperature
frequency response of the CCTO thin films changes from the response indicating
the presence of some relatively low conducting capacitive layers to purely
power law, and then towards frequency independent response with a relative
dielectric constant . The film conductance and dielectric
response decrease upon decrease of the temperature with dielectric response
being dominated by the power law frequency dependence. Below 80 K, the
dielectric response of the films is frequency independent with
close to . The results provide another piece of evidence for an
extrinsic, Maxwell-Wagner type, origin of the colossal dielectric response of
the bulk CCTO material, connected with electrical inhomogeneity of the bulk
material.Comment: v4: RevTeX, two-column, 9 pages, 7 figures; title modified, minor
content change in p.7, reference adde
Terahertz Conductivity at the Verwey Transition in Magnetite
The complex conductivity at the (Verwey) metal-insulator transition in
Fe_3O_4 has been investigated at THz and infrared frequencies. In the
insulating state, both the dynamic conductivity and the dielectric constant
reveal a power-law frequency dependence, the characteristic feature of hopping
conduction of localized charge carriers. The hopping process is limited to low
frequencies only, and a cutoff frequency nu_1 ~ 8 meV must be introduced for a
self-consistent description. On heating through the Verwey transition the
low-frequency dielectric constant abruptly decreases and becomes negative.
Together with the conductivity spectra this indicates a formation of a narrow
Drude-peak with a characteristic scattering rate of about 5 meV containing only
a small fraction of the available charge carriers. The spectra can be explained
assuming the transformation of the spectral weight from the hopping process to
the free-carrier conductivity. These results support an interpretation of
Verwey transition in magnetite as an insulator-semiconductor transition with
structure-induced changes in activation energy.Comment: 6 Pages, 3 Figure
Polaron relaxation and hopping conductivity in LaMnFeO
Dc and ac transport properties as well as electric modulus spectra have been
investigated for the samples LaMnFeO with compositions 0
1.0. The bulk dc resistivity shows a temperature variation
consistent with the variable range hopping mechanism at low temperature and
Arrhenius mechanism at high temperatures. The ac conductivity has been found to
follow a power law behavior at a limited temperature and frequency region where
Anderson-localization plays a significant role in the transport mechanism for
all the compositions. At low temperatures large dc resistivities and dielectric
relaxation behavior for all the compositions are consistent with the polaronic
nature of the charge carriers. Scaling of the modulus spectra shows that the
charge transport dynamics is independent of temperature for a particular
composition but depends strongly on different compositions possibly due to
different charge carrier concentrations and structural properties.Comment: 9 figure
Scaling of THz-conductivity at metal-insulator transition in doped manganites
Magnetic field and temperature dependence of the Terahertz conductivity and
permittivity of the colossal magnetoresistance manganite
Pr_{0.65}Ca_{0.28}Sr_{0.07}MnO_3 (PCSMO) is investigated approaching the
metal-to-insulator transition (MIT) from the insulating side. In the
charge-ordered state of PCSMO both conductivity and dielectric permittivity
increase as function of magnetic field and temperature. Universal scaling
relationships between the changes in permittivity and conductivity are observed
in a broad range of temperatures and magnetic fields. Similar scaling is also
seen in La_{1-x}Sr_xMnO_3 for different doping levels. The observed
proportionality points towards the importance of pure ac-conductivity and
phononic energy scale at MIT in manganites.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure
Colossal magnetocapacitance and scale-invariant dielectric response in phase-separated manganites
Thin films of strongly-correlated electron materials (SCEM) are often grown
epitaxially on planar substrates and typically have anisotropic properties that
are usually not captured by edge-mounted four-terminal electrical measurements,
which are primarily sensitive to in-plane conduction paths. Accordingly, the
correlated interactions in the out-of-plane (perpendicular) direction cannot be
measured but only inferred. We address this shortcoming and show here an
experimental technique in which the SCEM under study, in our case a 600
Angstrom-thick (La1-yPry)0.67Ca0.33MnO3 (LPCMO) film, serves as the base
electrode in a metal-insulator-metal (MIM) trilayer capacitor structure. This
unconventional arrangement allows for simultaneous determination of colossal
magnetoresistance (CMR) associated with dc transport parallel to the film
substrate and colossal magnetocapacitance (CMC) associated with ac transport in
the perpendicular direction. We distinguish two distinct strain-related
direction-dependent insulator-metal (IM) transitions and use Cole-Cole plots to
establish a heretofore unobserved collapse of the dielectric response onto a
universal scale-invariant power-law dependence over a large range of frequency,
temperature and magnetic field.Comment: 32 pages, 4 figures, Supplementary section included, Submitted to
Nature Physic
Extracting spectral density function of a binary composite without a-priori assumption
The spectral representation separates the contributions of geometrical
arrangement (topology) and intrinsic constituent properties in a composite. The
aim of paper is to present a numerical algorithm based on the Monte Carlo
integration and contrainted-least-squares methods to resolve the spectral
density function for a given system. The numerical method is verified by
comparing the results with those of Maxwell-Garnett effective permittivity
expression. Later, it is applied to a well-studied rock-and-brine system to
instruct its utility. The presented method yields significant microstructural
information in improving our understanding how microstructure influences the
macroscopic behaviour of composites without any intricate mathematics.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures and 1 tabl
Relaxation dynamics and ionic conductivity in a fragile plastic crystal
We report a thorough characterization of the dielectric relaxation behavior
and the ionic conductivity in the plastic-crystalline mixture of 60%
succinonitrile and 40% glutaronitrile. The plastic phase can be easily
supercooled and the relaxational behavior is investigated by broadband
dielectric spectroscopy in the liquid, plastic crystalline, and glassy crystal
phases. The very pronounced alpha-relaxation found in the spectra is
characterized in detail. From the temperature dependence of the
alpha-relaxation time, a fragility parameter of 62 was determined making this
material one of the most fragile plastic-crystalline glass formers. A
well-pronounced secondary and faint indications for a third relaxation process
were found, the latter most likely being of Johari-Goldstein type. In addition,
relatively strong conductivity contributions were detected in the spectra
exhibiting the typical features of ionic charge transport.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figure
Signs of low frequency dispersions in disordered binary dielectric mixtures (50-50)
Dielectric relaxation in disordered dielectric mixtures are presented by
emphasizing the interfacial polarization. The obtained results coincide with
and cause confusion with those of the low frequency dispersion behavior. The
considered systems are composed of two phases on two-dimensional square and
triangular topological networks. We use the finite element method to calculate
the effective dielectric permittivities of randomly generated structures. The
dielectric relaxation phenomena together with the dielectric permittivity
values at constant frequencies are investigated, and significant differences of
the square and triangular topologies are observed. The frequency dependent
properties of some of the generated structures are examined. We conclude that
the topological disorder may lead to the normal or anomalous low frequency
dispersion if the electrical properties of the phases are chosen properly, such
that for ``slightly'' {\em reciprocal mixture}--when , and
--normal, and while for ``extreme'' {\em reciprocal
mixture}--when , and --anomalous
low frequency dispersions are obtained. Finally, comparison with experimental
data indicates that one can obtain valuable information from simulations when
the material properties of the constituents are not available and of
importance.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figure
Origin of Low-Energy Excitations in Charge-Ordered Manganites
The low-energy excitations in the charge-ordered phase of polycrystalline
La0.25Ca0.75MnO3 are explored by frequency-domain terahertz spectroscopy. In
the frequency range from 4 cm^-1 to 700 cm^-1 (energies 0.4 meV to 90 meV) and
at temperatures down to 5 K, we do not detect any feature that can be
associated with the collective response of the spatially modulated charge
continuum. In the antiferromagnetically ordered phase, broad absorption bands
appear in the conductivity and permittivity spectra around 30 cm^-1 and 100
cm^-1 which are assigned to former acoustic phonons optically activated due to
a fourfold superstructure in the crystal lattice. Our results indicate that
characteristic energies of collective excitations of the charge-ordered phase
in La0:25Ca0:75MnO3, if any, lie below 1 meV. At our lowest frequencies of only
few wavenumbers a strong relaxation is observed above 100 K connected to the
formation of the charge-ordered state.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure
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