PLATFORM GRANT RENEWAL: Nanoscale Multifunctional Ferroic Materials and Devices

该平台赠款的更新是关于对新的纳米结构材料和设备进行研究，其中多功能性，特别是与铁性行为相结合，提供了关键主题。薄膜铁电材料是过去三年来该平台资助下研究的重要组成部分，提供了一系列重要的基本特性，包括：可以切换的铁电极化，压电性（在应力下产生电荷），热电性（由于温度变化产生电荷）和其他几种。这些性质现在被广泛应用于电子器件中，并且铁电薄膜开始被商业化开发。进一步研究的一个有趣的领域是这些基本性质可以与其他材料，特别是铁磁体和半导体的性质相结合，以实现可能用于器件应用的全新性质。在现有的赠款中，已经触及了一些可能性（例如磁电），很明显，进一步开展工作的潜力很大。人们希望这项研究将产生新的材料和结构，例如，半导体纳米颗粒的光发射可以通过切换紧密耦合的铁电材料的极化来控制，或者生物颗粒（如病毒存款）在表面上的方式可以通过切换下面的铁电层的极化来控制。研究人员还打算探索如何将多功能铁性材料中的这些新概念潜在地设计成有用的器件结构。

This Platform Grant renewal is about conducting research into new nanostructured materials and devices in which multi-functionality, particularly coupled with ferroic behaviour, provide the key themes. Thin film ferroelectric materials, which have been an essential part of the research under this Platform Grant for the past 3 years, provide an important set of basic properties, including: a ferroelectric polarisation that can be switched, piezoelectricity (the generation of charge under stress), pyroelectricity (the generation of charge due to temperature change) and several others. These properties are now widely used in electronic devices and ferroelectric thin films are starting to be exploited commercially. An intriguing area for further study is the way in which these basic properties can be coupled to those of other materials, especially ferromagnets and semiconductors, to achieve entirely new sets of properties that can potentially be used in device applications. Some of the possibilities have been touched-on in the existing Grant (magnetoelectricity, for example) and it is clear that there is great potential for further work. It is hoped that the research will produce new materials and structures in which, for example, the optical emission from semiconductor nanoparticles can be controlled by switching the polarisation of a closely-coupled ferroelectric material or the way in which biological particles such as viruses deposit on a surface can be controlled by switching the polarisation in an underlying ferroelectric layer. It is the researchers intention to also explore how these new concepts in multifunctional ferroic materials can be potentially engineered into useful device structures.