Artificial creation of threshold characteristics in the domain switching of ferroelectric—Ferroelastic Gadolinium molybdate

A new method of providing artificially well-defined threshold characteristics in the domain switching of ferroelectric-ferroelastic Gd
2
(MoO
4
)
3
single crystals is presented and experimentally confirmed. The essence of the idea lies in the utilization of a coupling effect between the strain and the polarization which is a characteristic of ferroelectric-ferroelastic crystals. The potential barrier required for electrical switching with a definite threshold is produced by the strain due to locally deposited surface films, which results in strain-induced multidomain regions beneath the films and stabilizes the domain wall at the end of strain-free switching regions. The measured characteristics of the threshold switching elements were as follows; threshold voltage
V_{t}=190
V and switching time
t_{s} = 0.6
ms at applied full voltage
V_{f} = 250
V. These threshold switching elements have potential applications to a ferroelectric light valve array and a ferroelectric memory device.