STATICS AND DYNAMICS OF FERROELECTRIC DOMAINS STUDIED WITH SCANNING FORCE MICROSCOPY

Scanning force microscopy for studying ferroelectric domain structures is applied. The force microscope was operated in the contact static mode (repulsive force regime) and in the noncontact dynamic mode (attractive force regime). These two techniques were applied to study cleavage faces of ferroelectric crystals of GASH (guanidinium aluminum sulfate hexahydrate) and TGS (triglycine sulfate) crystals. Using the contact mode, the positive and negative domains are revealed by opposite contrast. In the dynamic noncontact mode, the domain walls are revealed. The experimental setup allows in situ experiments to study the dynamics of ferroelectric domains. First results on the time dependence of the domains motion in TGS will be presented.