Landau-Ginzburg-Devonshire theory

Figure 8.3 Phase diagram for epitaxially-strained PbTiOs calculated using Landau-Ginzburg-Devonshire theory [9]. The dashed line shows the epitaxial strain corresponding to a SrTiC>3...

A primary focus of our work has been to understand the ferroelectric phase transition in thin epitaxial films of PbTiOs. It is expected that epitaxial strain effects are important in such films because of the large, anisotropic strain associated with the phase transition. Figure 8.3 shows the phase diagram for PbTiOs as a function of epitaxial strain and temperature calculated using Landau-Ginzburg-Devonshire (lgd) theory [9], Here epitaxial strain is defined as the in-plane strain imposed by the substrate, experienced by the cubic (paraelectric) phase of PbTiOs. The dashed line shows that a coherent PbTiOs film on a SrTiOs substrate experiences somewhat more than 1 % compressive epitaxial strain. Such compressive strain favors the ferroelectric PbTiOs phase having the c domain orientation, i.e. with the c (polar) axis normal to the film. From Figure 8.3 one can see that the paraelectric-ferroelectric transition temperature Tc for coherently-strained PbTiOs films on SrTiOs is predicted to be elevated by 260°C above that of... 

Barium titanate is also the first material with the ferroelectricity studied theoretically by Devonshire (1949). Theoretical description is based on the idea of the thermodynamic potentials known from the Landau-Ginzburg theory of phase transitions (Devonshire 1949, 1951). Barium titanate is mainly used in multilayer ceramic capacitors and in positive temperature coefficient (PTC) elements (Bhalla et al. 2000). 

W.L. Ginzburg and L. Landau developed a phenomenological theory, the GL theory , which makes no assumptions concerning the basic mechanism responsible for superconductivity. In this respect the approach is similar to the Devonshire phenomenological theory as applied to ferroelectrics (see Section... 

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