Electric field induced phase transition and electrocaloric effect in PMN-PT

Abstract

Ferroelectric perovskite oxides possess a large electrocaloric (EC) effect, but usually at high temperatures near the ferroelectric/paraelectric phase transition temperature, which limits their potential application as next-generation solid-state cooling devices. We use classical molecular dynamics to study the electric field induced phase transitions and EC effect in PMN-PT (PbMg1/3Nb2/3O3-PbTiO3). We find that the maximum EC strength of PMN-PT occurs within the morphotropic phase boundary (MPB) region at 300 K. The large adiabatic temperature change is caused by easy rotation of polarization within the MPB region.

17 pages, 7 figures

References in corpus (1)

• Giant electrocaloric effect around T${}_c$

Cited by in corpus (2)

• Giant electrocaloric effect at the antiferroelectric-to-ferroelectric phase boundary in PbZrTiO${}_3$
• Polarization rotation and the electrocaloric effect in barium titanate