Issue 25, 2021

Room-temperature ferroelectric and ferroelastic orders coexisting in a new tetrafluoroborate-based perovskite

Abstract

The coexistence of multiferroic orders has attracted increasing attention for its potential applications in multiple-state memory, switches, and computing, but it is still challenging to design single-phase crystalline materials hosting multiferroic orders at above room temperature. By utilizing versatile ABX3-type perovskites as a structural model, we judiciously introduced a polar organic cation with easily changeable conformations into a tetrafluoroborate-based perovskite system, and successfully obtained an unprecedented molecular perovskite, (homopiperazine-1,4-diium)[K(BF4)3], hosting both ferroelectricity and ferroelasticity at above room temperature. By using the combined techniques of variable-temperature single-crystal X-ray structural analyses, differential scanning calorimetry, and dielectric, second harmonic generation, and piezoresponse force microscopy measurements, we demonstrated the domain structures for ferroelectric and ferroelastic orders, and furthermore disclosed how the delicate interplay between stepwise changed dynamics of organic cations and cooperative deformation of the inorganic framework induces ferroelectric and ferroelastic phase transitions at 311 K and 455 K, respectively. This instance, together with the underlying mechanism of ferroic transitions, provides important clues for designing advanced multiferroic materials based on organic–inorganic hybrid crystals.

Graphical abstract: Room-temperature ferroelectric and ferroelastic orders coexisting in a new tetrafluoroborate-based perovskite

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Edge Article
Submitted
07 mar 2021
Accepted
16 may 2021
First published
17 may 2021
This article is Open Access

All publication charges for this article have been paid for by the Royal Society of Chemistry
Creative Commons BY-NC license

Chem. Sci., 2021,12, 8713-8721

Room-temperature ferroelectric and ferroelastic orders coexisting in a new tetrafluoroborate-based perovskite

X. Chen, X. Zhang, D. Liu, R. Huang, S. Wang, L. Xiong, W. Zhang and X. Chen, Chem. Sci., 2021, 12, 8713 DOI: 10.1039/D1SC01345A

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications, without requesting further permission from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given and it is not used for commercial purposes.

To request permission to reproduce material from this article in a commercial publication, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party commercial publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements