SrTiO₃ Under Uniaxial Strain Applied With a Piezoelectric-based Device

抄録

Application of uniaxial strain or pressure can induce novel electronic states in strongly correlated systems. SrTiO3 (STO) is normally an incipient ferroelectric and becomes ferroelectric due to some perturbation such as Ca substitution, isotope effect, or pressure. A piezoelectric strain cell was developed, based on the work by C. Hicks’ strain cell, to achieve both compressive and tensile uniaxial strain in single crystals to discover new electronic phenomenon. Experiments indicate that the piezodevice achieved lower strain than that expected by simulation by a factor of ~3. The discrepancy may arise due to the inaccuracy of modeling the stycast-sample interface geometry to reflect the actual experimental conditions. Given the achieved strain the ferroelectric transition was not observed. The piezoelectric-based straining device is promising for studying many systems under uniaxial strain and can be used in conjunction with capacitance or x-ray diffraction measurements.