Epitaxial (001) BiFeO3 membranes with substantially reduced fatigue and leakage

We report substantially reduced fatigue and electrical leakage in BiFeO3 membranes fabricated by releasing epitaxial (001) BiFeO3 films from the Si substrates on which they were grown. Fatigue-free switching behavior of up to 10(10) cycles was observed for BiFeO3 membranes with Pt top electrodes, while as-grown films break down at similar to 10(9) cycles. This is attributed to the low coercive field of BiFeO3 membranes and their being free from substrate clamping. In contrast, (111) BiFeO3 films exhibit significant fatigue at the same electric field. Epitaxial (001) BiFeO3 membranes with low coercive field are very promising for lead-free ferroelectric memory and magnetoelectric devices. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.