Evolution of nanodomains under DC electrical bias in Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3-PbTiO3: An In-situ transmission electron microscopy study

Domain structure and its evolution under electrical biases play important roles in piezoelectrics. The effects could be more significant in morphotropic phase boundary piezoelectrics, such as Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3-PbTiO3 (PMN-PT), since domains are miniaturized down to nanometer scale. Here, we report in-situ transmission electron microscopy observations for evolution of nanodomains under DC electrical biases in PMN-PT. We find that nanodomains switch with redistributions of invariant nanodomains population for the unpoled crystals, which is consistent with our previous results for the poled cases. This suggests that response of nanodomains for the unpoled and poled crystals can be understood in similar ways.