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  • Letter
  • Open Access

Imaging ferroelectric domains with soft-x-ray ptychography at the oxygen K-edge

Tim A. Butcher1,2,*, Nicholas W. Phillips1,3, Chia-Chun Wei4, Shih-Chao Chang4, Igor Beinik5, Karina Thånell5, Jan-Chi Yang4,6, Shih-Wen Huang1, Jörg Raabe1 et al.

Simone Finizio1

  • *Contact author: tim.butcher@psi.ch
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Phys. Rev. Applied 23, L011002 – Published 7 January, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.23.L011002

Abstract

The ferroelectric domain structure of a freestanding BiFeO3 film was visualized by ptychographic dichroic imaging with linearly polarized x-rays at the O K-edge around 530 eV. The dichroic contrast is maximized at the energy of the hybridization of the O 2p state and the Fe 3d orbitals, which is split by the octahedral crystal field of the perovskite structure. The microscopy images thus obtained complement the ptychographic imaging of the antiferromagnetic contribution at the Fe L3-edge. The approach can be extended to the separation of different ferroic contributions in other multiferroic oxides.

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Outline

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Phys. Rev. Applied 23, L011002– Published 7 January, 2025
  • Received 20 August 2024
  • Revised 18 October 2024
  • Accepted 2 December 2024
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

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