Measurement of a solid-state triple point at the metal-insulator transition in VO2

Abstract

First-order phase transitions in solids are notoriously challenging to study. The combination of change in unit cell shape, long range of elastic distortion, and flow of latent heat leads to large energy barriers resulting in domain structure, hysteresis, and cracking. The situation is still worse near a triple point where more than two phases are involved. The famous metal-insulator transition (MIT) in vanadium dioxide, a popular candidate for ultrafast optical and electrical switching applications, is a case in point. Even though VO2 is one of the simplest strongly correlated materials, experimental difficulties posed by the first-order nature of the MIT as well as the involvement of at least two competing insulating phases have led to persistent controversy about its nature. Here, we show that studying single-crystal VO2 nanobeams in a purpose-built nanomechanical strain apparatus allows investigation of this prototypical phase transition with unprecedented control and precision. Our results include the striking finding that the triple point of the metallic and two insulating phases is at the transition temperature, T_tr = T_c, which we determine to be 65.0 +- 0.1 C. The findings have profound implications for the mechanism of the MIT in VO2, but in addition they demonstrate the importance of such an approach for mastering phase transitions in many other strongly correlated materials, such as manganites and iron-based superconductors.

15 pages including figures and supplementary information

References in corpus (2)

• Mott transition in VO2 revealed by infrared spectroscopy and nano-imaging
• VO2: A Novel View from Band Theory

Cited by in corpus (67)

• Piezoelectric-based apparatus for strain tuning
• Hydrogenating VO2 with protons in acid solution
• Metal-insulator Transition in VO2: a DFT+DMFT perspective
• Direct Observation of Decoupled Structural and Electronic Transitions and an Ambient Pressure Monoclinic-Like Metallic Phase of VO${}_2$
• Structural instability of the rutile compounds and its relevance to the metal-insulator transition of VO2
• Sequential Electronic and Structural Transitions in VO2 Observed Using X-ray Absorption Spectromicroscopy
• Ultrafast mid-infrared nanoscopy of strained vanadium dioxide nanobeams
• Unraveling the Mott-Peierls intrigue in Vanadium dioxide
• Triply degenerate nodal points in RERh${}_6$Ge${}_4$ (RE=Y, La, Lu)
• Ultrafast THz Field Control of Electronic and Structural Interactions in Vanadium Dioxide
• In situ diffraction study of catalytic hydrogenation of VO2: Stable phases and origins of metallicity
• Large epitaxial bi-axial strain induces a Mott-like phase transition in VO2
• Epitaxial stabilization of ultra thin films of high entropy perovskite
• Transient dynamics of the phase transition in VO2 revealed by mega electron-volt ultrafast electron diffraction
• Origin of current-controlled negative differential resistance modes and the emergence of composite characteristics with high complexity
• Tuning the Hysteresis of a Metal-Insulator Transition via Lattice Compatibility
• Unified Band Theoretic Description of Electronic and Magnetic Properties of Vanadium Dioxide Phases
• Mechanical Switching of Nanoscale Multiferroic Phase Boundaries
• Does VO${}_2$ Host a Transient Monoclinic Metallic Phase?
• Ramp Reversal Memory and Phase-Boundary Scarring in Transition Metal Oxides
• Uniting the order and disorder dynamics in photoexcited VO2
• Ultrafast Electron-Lattice Coupling Dynamics in VO2 and V2O3 Thin Films
• Unconventional hysteretic transition in a charge density wave
• Direct observation of the M2 phase with its Mott transition in a VO${}_2$ film
• The phase transition in VO2 probed using x-ray, visible and infrared radiations
• Isothermal current-driven insulator-to-metal transition in VO${}_{\text{2}}$ through strong correlation effect
• Thermopower analysis of metal-insulator transition temperature modulations in vanadium dioxide thin films with lattice distortion
• Nanoscale spectroscopic imaging of phase separation in a correlated material by resonant X-ray holography
• Hierarchical stripe phases in IrTe2 driven by competition between Ir dimerization and Te bonding
• Role of 1-D finite size Heisenberg chain in increasing metal to insulator transition temperature in hole rich VO2
• A possible four-phase coexistence in a single-component system
• Magnetoelectric Coupling by Giant Piezoelectric Tensor Design
• The photoinduced hidden metallic phase of monoclinic VO2 driven by local nucleation via a self-amplification process
• Large entropy change derived from the orbitally assisted three-centered two-electron σ bond formation in a metallic Li0.33VS2
• Highly repeatable nanoscale phase coexistence in vanadium dioxide films
• Separating electric field and thermal effects across the metal-insulator transition in vanadium oxide nanobeams
• \textit{Ab initio} molecular dynamics study of the structural and electronic transition in VO${}_2$
• Entropic patchiness drives multi-phase coexistence in discotic colloid-depletant mixtures
• Mapping nanoscale charge states and phase domains with quantitative hyperspectral coherent diffractive imaging spectroscopy
• The two-dimensional disordered Mott metal-insulator transition
• Ultrafast insulator-to-metal transition in VO${}_2$ nanostructures assisted by picosecond strain pulses
• Possible phonon-induced electronic bi-stability in VO${}_2$ for ultrafast memory at room temperature
• Observation of weakened V-V dimers in the monoclinic metallic phase of strained VO2
• High-strain-induced local modification of the electronic properties of VO${}_2$ thin films
• Transient Electronic Phase Separation During Metal-Insulator Transitions
• Influence of thermal boundary conditions on the current-driven resistive transition in $\mathbf{V}{\mathbf{O}}_2$ microbridges
• Materials, physics, and systems for multicaloric cooling
• Quantum Sensing of Insulator-to-Metal Transitions in a Mott Insulator
• VO${}_2$ under hydrostatic pressure: Isostructural phase transition close to a critical end-point
• Synthesis of V${}_2$O${}_3$ Nanoplates
• Correlating the Energetics and Atomic Motions of the Metal-Insulator Transition of M1 Vanadium Dioxide
• Nanostructure Investigations of Nonlinear Differential Conductance in NdNiO${}_3$ Thin Films
• An oxygen-rich, tetrahedral surface phase on high-temperature rutile VO${}_2$(110)${}_{\text{T}}$ single crystals
• Visualization of one-dimensional diffusion and spontaneous segregation of hydrogen in single crystals of VO2
• Occupation switching of $d$ orbitals probed via hyperfine interactions in vanadium dioxide
• Thermoelectric probe of defect state induced by ionic liquid gating in vanadium dioxide
• Electron-proton Co-doping Induced Metal-insulator Transition in VO2 Film via Surface Self-assembled Ascorbic Acid Molecules
• Bilayer Vanadium Dioxide Thin Film with Elevated Transition Temperatures and High Resistance Switching
• Small polarons mediated near-room-temperature metal-insulator transition in vanadium dioxide and their hopping dynamics
• Metal-insulator transition upon heating and negative-differential-resistive-switching induced by self-heating in BaCo0.9Ni0.1S1.8
• Low temperature spin Seebeck effect in non-magnetic vanadium dioxide
• Hubbard Physics in the PAW GW Approximation
• Thermally Driven Analog of the Barkhausen Effect at the Metal-Insulator Transition in Vanadium Dioxide
• Identification of a monoclinic metallic state in VO2 from a modified first-principles approach
• Toward nonthermal control of excited quantum materials: framework and investigations by ultrafast electron scattering and imaging
• Correlative Ultrafast Imaging of a Propagating Photo-Driven Phase Transition Using 4D STEM
• Control of plasmonic nanoantennas by reversible metal-insulator transition