Tilt control of the charged domain walls in lithium niobate

The utilization of charged domain walls (CDWs) as nanoelectronic devices requires three technological aspects to be developed: (1) controllable CDW creation, (2) tuning of CDW geometry, and (3) CDW removal. We have studied CDW formation in lithium niobate single crystals during polarization reversal using liquid and solid-state electrodes, as well as their combination. It was shown that CDW can be formed by two alternative procedures: (1) by forward switching for the liquid electrode at the Z+ polar surface and solid at the Z− one, (2) by backward switching for solid at the Z+ polar surface and liquid at the Z− one. The created CDW can be transformed to an almost neutral domain wall by the application of the field pulse of the reverse polarity for both procedures. As a result, the tilt of the formed CDW can be tuned reversibly in the range from 0.2° to 1.2° resulting in a change between isolated and highly conductive states. We have demonstrated that the created CDW can be used as a nanoelectronic channel for local electrolysis opening the additional possibilities for ferroelectric lithography.