Ferroelectric and piezoelectric behaviors of individual single crystalline BaTiO3 nanowire under direct axial electric biasing

A method, which is especially useful for the study of ferroelectric nanowire with piezoresponse force microscopy (PFM), was developed. In this method electric bias is directly applied on the axial direction of nanowire. The axial poling and switching of single crystalline BaTiO3 nanowire were realized, and hysteresis loop and shear piezoresponse were acquired with PFM operated in lateral mode. The study demonstrated the ferroelectric nature of the nanowire and the need of a significantly higher poling electric field to reach polarization saturation in nanowire than that in bulk BaTiO3 crystal.