Crystal growth and domain structure evolution

Abstract

The evolution of ferroelectric domain structure is considered as an example of kinetics of phase transformation process. Some analogies are revealed between crystal growth and domain kinetics in model uniaxial ferroelectrics. Within this approach the mechanisms of arising regular shaped, chaotic and fractal-type domain structures are explained. It is shown that observed peculiarities of arising domain patterns are due to the complicated origin of local electric field which is the driving force of the switching process.

Key Words:

• crystal growth
• polarization reversal
• domain structure
• fractals, nonequilibrium state
• phase transition