Organic and inorganic relaxor ferroelectrics with giant electrocaloric effect

The electrocaloric effect (ECE) in inorganic thin film and organic relaxor ferroelectrics is investigated by directly measuring the ECE around room temperature. The results reveal that giant ECEs can be obtained in the high energy electron irradiated poly (vinylidene fluoride-trifluoroethylene) relaxor copolymer and in the La-doped Pb(ZrTi)O-3 relaxor ceramic thin films, which are much larger than that from the normal ferroelectric counterparts. The large ECE observed, compared with normal ferroelectrics, is likely caused by the large number of disordered fluctuating polarization entities in relaxor ferroelectrics which can lead to extra entropy contributions and larger ECE. (C) 2010 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3501975]