Magnetoelectric multiferroicity and quantum paraelectricity in hexaferrites

Multiferroic materials with coexisting ferroelectric and magnetic orders have attracted tremendous research interests because of their intriguing fundamental physics as well as potential applications in the next-generation multifunctional devices. Hexaferrites with conical magnetic structures are among the most promising single-phase multiferroics because strong magnetoelectric effects can be achieved in them from low temperatures up to room temperature in low magnetic fields. In this review, after briefly introducing the background on multiferroics and classification of hexaferrites, we summarize recent progress in multiferroic hexaferrites, including the mechanisms of spin-induced ferroelectricity, the magnetoelectric phase diagram, giant direct and converse magnetoelectric effects. Furthermore, we present a new mechanism of magnetic-ion-induced displacive polarization in hexaferrites, which leads to quantum paraelectricity and quantum electric-dipole liquid in M-type hexaferrites.

Generation of Higher Terahertz Harmonics in Nonlinear Paraelectrics under Focusing in a Wide Temperature Range

It is theoretically investigated the generation of higher harmonics of two-dimensional and three-dimensional terahertz electromagnetic beams in nonlinear crystals. The attention is paid to crystalline paraelectrics like SrTiO3 under the temperatures 60 - 200 K, these crystals possess the cubic nonlinearity. The bias electric field is applied to provide the dominating quadratic nonlinearity. The initial focusing of the beams not only increases the efficiency of generation of higher harmonics, but alto makes possible to select maxima of different higher harmonics at some distances from the input. At lower temperatures the nonlinearity behaves at smaller input amplitudes, whereas at higher temperatures the harmonic generation can be observed at higher frequencies up to 1.5 THz. In three-dimensional beams the peak amplitudes of higher harmonics can be bigger than in two-dimensional beams, but the ratios of these peak values to the maximum values of the focused first harmonic are smaller than in two-dimensional beams.

Nonlinear Terahertz Electromagnetic Waves in SrTiO3 Crystals under Focusing

The nonlinear waves of terahertz (THz) range are investigated in the paraelectric crystals SrTiO3 at the temperatures ~77 K. The frequency dispersion is important there. In the absence of a bias electric field the dominating nonlinearity is cubic. The frequency dispersion and nonlinearity correspond to existence of envelope solitons and the modulation instability (MI) of long input pulses, whereas in the transverse direction MI is absent. There exists a possibility to generate the regular sequences of short THz pulses due to MI in bounded SrTiO3 crystals. The focusing of input long pulses reduces the threshold of MI, increases the output amplitudes of the short pulses, and provides more stable generation of the short pulses. It is investigated the frequency multiplication of THz electromagnetic radiation in bounded paraelectric SrTiO3 when a bias electric field is applied. The dominating nonlinearity is quadratic there. The frequency dispersion and the transverse width of the input wave beams affect the generation of higher harmonics. It is possible to select the certain numbers of higher harmonics by means of the optimum length of the crystal, by the width of the beam of the input first harmonic, and by the focusing of the input first harmonic.

High Dielectric Constant and Low-loss Dielectric Ceramics of Sr_5 LnTi_3Ta_7O_(30)(Ln=La,Nd,Sm and Y)

Polycrystalline Sr5LnTi3Ta7O30 （Ln=La, Nd, Sm and Y） ceramics were prepared as single-phase materials through conventional solid-state ceramics method. The structure was characterized by X-ray diffraction method and scanning electron microscopy （SEM）. The dielectric properties were measured from room temperature to 400℃. All compounds are paraelectric phases adopting the filled tetragonal tungsten bronze （TB） structure at room temperature. At 1 MHz their dielectric constant （ετ） varied from 109 to 139, dielectric loss changed from 0.003 3 to 0.005 8, and the temperature coefficients of the dielectric constant （τε） moved from -710 to -880×10^-6℃^-1.

The first 2D organic-inorganic hybrid relaxor-ferroelectric single crystal

Inorganic relaxor ferroelectric solid solution single crystals are spurring new generations of high performance electromechanical devices,including transducers,sensors,and actuators,due to their ultrahigh electric field induced strain,large piezoelectric constant,high electromechanical coupling factor and low dielectric loss.However,relaxor ferroelectric single crystals found in organic-inorganic hybrid perovskites are very limited,but achieving these superior properties in them will be of great significance in the design of modern functional materials.Fortunately,here the first two-dimensional(2D)organic-inorganic hybrid relaxor ferroelectric single crystal,[Br(CH_(2))_(3)NH_(3)]_(2)PbBr_(4)(BPA_(2)-PbBr_(4),BPA=3-bromopropylamine),achieves some of superior properties.Interestingly,BPA_(2)-PbBr_(4)reveals a successive relaxor ferroelectric-ferroelectric-paraelectric phase transitions accompanying by a large degree of relaxationΔT_(relax)=61 K and ultralow energy loss(tanδ<0.001).Meanwhile,it exhibits a superior second harmonic generation(SHG)effect with maximum value accounts for 95%of the standard KDP due to great deformation of structure(3.2302×10^(-4)).In addition,temperature dependent luminescence spectra(80-415 K)exhibit fluorescence and phosphorescence overlapping emission originated from inorganic and organic components with the nanosecond-scale short lifetime and the millisecond-scale long lifetime,respectively,and the color of the emitted light is continuously adjustable,which is the first to achieve luminescence and relaxor ferroelectricity compatibility.

Possible quantum paraelectric state in Kitaev spin liquid candidate H3LiIr2O6

A new quantum spin liquid(QSL)candidate material H3LiIr2O6 was synthesized recently and was found not to show any magnetic order or phase transition down to low temperatures.In this work,we study the quantum dynamics of the hydrogen ions,i.e.,protons,in this material by combining first-principles calculations and theoretical analysis.We show that each proton and its adjacent oxygen ions form an electric dipole.The dipole interactions and the proton tunneling are captured by a transverse-field Ising model with a quantum disordered paraelectric ground state.The dipole excitations have an energy gap△d=60 meV,and can be probed by the infrared optical spectroscopy and the dielectric response.We argue that the electric dipole fluctuations renormalize the magnetic interactions in H3LiIr2O6 and lead to a Kitaev QSL state.

Phase engineering in NaNbO_(3) antiferroelectrics for high energystorage density

The NaNbO_(3) antiferroelectrics have been considered as a potential candidate for dielectric capacitorsapplications. However, the high-electric-field-unstable antiferroelectric phase resulted in low energystorage density and efficiency. Herein, good energy storage properties were realized in (1-x)NaNbO_(3)- xNaTaO_(3) ceramics, by building a new phase boundary. As a result, a high recoverable energy density(Wrec) of 2.2 J/cm3 and efficiency (h) of 80.1% were achieved in 0.50NaNbO_(3)-0.50NaTaO_(3) ceramic at300 kV/cm. The excellent energy storage performance originates from an antiferroelectric-paraelectricphase boundary with simultaneously high polarization and low hysteresis, by tailoring the ratio ofantiferroelectric and paraelectric phases. Moreover, the 0.50NaNbO_(3)-0.50NaTaO_(3) ceramic also exhibitedgood temperature and frequency stability, together with excellent charge-discharge performance. Theresults pave a good way of designing new NaNbO_(3)-based antiferroelectrics with good energy storageperformance.