Absence of ferroelectricity in BiMnO3 ceramics

Abstract

We performed factor-group analysis of all phonons in possible monoclinic C2/c and C2 structures of BiMnO3 and compared it with our experimental infrared and Raman spectra. We conclude that the crystal structure is centrosymmetric C2/c in the whole investigated temperature range from 10 to 550 K, therefore BiMnO3 cannot be ferroelectric. We revealed a dielectric relaxation in THz spectra above the structural phase transition taking place at T_C1=475 K giving evidence in strong lattice anharmonicity and a large dynamical disorder of Bi cations above T_C1. Step-like dielectric anomaly observed at T_C1 in THz permittivity reminds antiferroelectric phase transition. Nevertheless, the low-temperature dielectric studies did not reveal any antiferroelectric or ferroelectric hysteresis loop. Our experimental results support theoretical paper of P. Baettig et al. (J. Am. Chem. Soc. 129, 9854 (2007)) claiming that BiMnO3 is not multiferroic, but only antipolar ferromagnet.

arXiv commentaccepted to JAP

References in corpus (5)

• Materials with Colossal Dielectric Constant: Do They Exist?
• First Principles Investigation of Ferromagnetism and Ferroelectricity in Bismuth Manganite
• Structural anomalies at the magnetic transition in centrosymmetric BiMnO${}_3$
• Anisotropic dielectric function in polar nano-regions of relaxor ferroelectrics
• Terahertz and Infrared Studies of Antiferroelectric Phase Transition in Multiferroic Bi_0.85Nd_0.15FeO_3

Cited by in corpus (4)

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• Thermally activated magnetization reversal in bulk BiFe0.5Mn0.5O3
• Optical study of the vibrational and dielectric properties of BiMnO3