PIEZOELECTRICALLY-INDUCED SWITCHING OF 90-DEGREES DOMAINS IN TETRAGONAL BATIO3 AND PBTIO3 INVESTIGATED BY MICRO-RAMAN SPECTROSCOPY

Domain switching of 90-degrees ferroelectric domains in tetragonal BaTiO3 and PbTiO3 is induced by the application of stress along specific crystallographic axes. For BaTiO3, single-domain crystals are obtained from twinned specimens by the application of approximately 1.1 MPa of stress parallel to the a axis and twin boundaries are induced by application of approximately 0.22 MPa of stress parallel to the c axis. Similar piezoelectrically-induced domain switching was observed in PbTiO3 at elevated temperature. We observed the rotation of the crystallographic axes associated with domain switching via micro-Raman spectroscopy. These results were consistent with optical microscope images of the domain switching which demonstrates the usefulness of micro-Raman spectroscopy for the study of ferroelectric domain structures. A phenomenological treatment of domain switching in a piezoelectrically-coupled system is described.