Self-Organized Formation of Quasi-Regular Ferroelectric Nanodomain Structure on the Nonpolar Cuts by Grounded SPM Tip

The understanding of self-organization processes at the micro- and nanoscale is of fundamental interest and is important to meet the great challenges in further miniaturization of electronic devices to the nanoscale. Here, we report self-organized quasi-regular nanodomain structure formation on the nonpolar cut of a ferroelectric lithium niobate single crystal. These structures were formed along the trajectory of grounded scanning probe microscope tip approaching or moving away from the freshly switched region. Detailed analysis of the formed structures revealed internal organization by the length of the needle-like domains, which ranged from uniform to quasi-periodic and even chaotic modes as a function of distance from the switched region. Comprehensive investigations and numerical simulations allowed to attribute explored phenomena to charge injection during the field application and further switching under the action of electric field induced by injected charges near the tip. Self-organization and quasi-periodicity were explained by the effective screening and long-range electrostatic interaction between the individual needle-like domains.