Enhanced self-powered UV photoresponse of ferroelectric BaTiO3 materials by pyroelectric effect

Ferroelectric material BaTiO3 (BTO) with intrinsic spontaneous polarization demonstrates excellent pyroelectric effect that output current/voltage signals can be observed even by slight temperature fluctuation. Here, we report a self-powered 365 nm UV light photodetector by using the light-induced pyroelectric effect in Ag/BTO/Ag device with the response time of about 0.5 s at the rising edge. Moreover, the heating-induced pyroelectric effect has been utilized to enhance the 365 nm light response, where both the corresponding photoconductive gain and responsivity can be dramatically enhanced by larger than 1200% under a temperature variation rate of 2.1 K/s as compared with that of UV light illumination. Our study proposes a feasible method to enhance the 365 nm light response by coupling light and heating-induced pyroelectric effect in BTO, which has potential applications in thermal energy scavenging and self-powered sensor systems.