| Abstract: | Varying the film thickness is a precise route to tune the interfacial strain to manipulate the properties of the multiferroic materials.Here,to explore the effects of the interfacial strain on the properties of the multiferroic BiFeO_3films,we investigated thickness-dependent structural and polarization evolutions of the BiFeO_3 films.The epitaxial growth with an atomic stacking sequence of BiO/TiO_2 at the interface was confirmed by scanning transmission electron microscopy.Combining X-ray diffraction experiments and first-principles calculations,a thickness-dependent structural evolution was observed from a fully strained tetragonality to a partially relaxed one without any structural phase transition or rotated twins.The tetragonality(c/a) of the BiFeO_3 films increases as the film thickness decreases,while the polarization is in contrast with this trend,and the size effect including the depolarization field plays a crucial role in this contradiction in thinner films.These findings offer an alternative strategy to manipulate structural and polarization properties by tuning the interfacial strain in epitaxial multiferroic thin films. |
