Enhancement of the giant electromechanical response in relaxor ferroelectrics due to the critical point proximity

Abstract

I The dielectric, heat capacity, and piezoelectric investigations of PMN-PT crystals show the existence of a line of critical points for the paraelectric to ferroelectric transformations in the composition-temperature-electric field (x-T-E) phase diagram. On approaching the critical point both the enthalpy cost to induce the intermediate monoclinic states and thus the barier for polarization rotations decrease significantly.