Ferroelectrics Materials for Microwave Devices

A special issue of Crystals (ISSN 2073-4352). This special issue belongs to the section "Inorganic Crystalline Materials".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 April 2022) | Viewed by 14648

Special Issue Editors

IETR UMR CNRS 6164, University of Nantes, 2 Rue de la Houssinière, 44322 Nantes, France
Interests: ferroelectric materials; antiferroelectric materials; domain walls; thin films; chemical solution deposition; impedance spectroscopy
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
University of Tours, GREMAN UMR 7347
Interests: microwave devices; antennas; ferroelectric materials; electrical characterizations; impedance spectroscopy; microelectronic; micromechanical devices
Université de Nantes - IETR (Institut d'Electronique et des Technologies du numéRique)UMR CNRS 6164
Interests: ferroelectric and antiferroelectric materials,modeling of dielectric; piezoelectric and ferroelectric properties; modeling of domain walls displacement; energy storage
Université de Nantes - IETR (Institut d'Electronique et des Technologies du numéRique) UMR CNRS 6164
Interests: functional ferroelectricsand antiferroelectrics; dynamic properties; ferroelectric electron emission; local impedance spectroscopy; microwave and smart sensor applications

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Due to their non-linear and anisotropic characteristics, polar ferroelectric materials have found many applications where integrated functionalities are required. More recently, they have attracted particular interest as electrically tunable filters, capacitors, oscillators, resonators, or phase shifters for the development of mobile telecommunication devices that need reconfiguration at microwave frequencies.

For application in microwave devices, thin ferroelectric films have been grown on various substrates using methods such as hydrothermal, sol–gel synthesis, sputtering, plasma CVD, MOCVD, PLD, etc.

Materials have been synthesized and studied at a fundamental level through modeling, fabrications, and experiments to obtain relevant compositions or phases and optimum dielectric properties.

We invite researchers to submit original papers that discuss the development of ferroelectric materials, including thin-film, nanostructured, and multilayered forms that are or can be included in microwave devices.

This Special Issue focuses on ferroelectric materials for microwave devices. The possible topics include but are not limited to the following:

  • Growth of ferroelectric thin films or nanostructures, including the modeling of crystal growth or reaction mechanisms;
  • Property characterization (dielectric, ferroelectric, piezoelectric, etc.) and its relationships to external conditions, such as electric field, stress, temperature, etc.
  • Advances in microwave device development (conception, simulation, material integration) based on ferroelectric materials using thin films or nanostructures;
  • Microstructure analysis and correlation of the observed properties and their modeling.

Dr. Caroline Borderon
Dr. Kevin Nadaud
Dr. Raphaël Renoud
Prof. Dr. Hartmut W. Gundel
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Crystals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • Ferroelectric and anti-ferroelectric films
  • Dielectric characterization
  • Domain engineering
  • Microwave device development
  • Polarization reconfiguration
  • Antennas

Published Papers (6 papers)

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Research

9 pages, 2955 KiB  
Article
RF-Characterization of HZO Thin Film Varactors
by Sukhrob Abdulazhanov, Quang Huy Le, Dang Khoa Huynh, Defu Wang, Maximilian Lederer, Ricardo Olivo, Konstantin Mertens, Jennifer Emara, Thomas Kämpfe and Gerald Gerlach
Crystals 2021, 11(8), 980; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11080980 - 18 Aug 2021
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2466
Abstract
A microwave characterization at UHF band of a ferroelectric hafnium zirconium oxide metal-ferroelectric-metal (MFM) capacitors for varactor applications has been performed. By using an impedance reflectivity method, a complex dielectric permittivity was obtained at frequencies up to 500 MHz. Ferroelectric Hf0.5Zr [...] Read more.
A microwave characterization at UHF band of a ferroelectric hafnium zirconium oxide metal-ferroelectric-metal (MFM) capacitors for varactor applications has been performed. By using an impedance reflectivity method, a complex dielectric permittivity was obtained at frequencies up to 500 MHz. Ferroelectric Hf0.5Zr0.5O2 of 10 nm thickness has demonstrated a stable permittivity switching in the whole frequency range. A constant increase of the calculated dielectric loss is observed, which is shown to be an effect of electric field distribution on highly resistive titanium nitride (TiN) thin film electrodes. The C-V characteristics of a “butterfly” shape was also extracted, where the varactors exhibited a reduction of capacitance tunability from 18.6% at 10 MHz to 15.4% at 500 MHz. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Ferroelectrics Materials for Microwave Devices)
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19 pages, 2721 KiB  
Article
Analyses of Substrate-Dependent Broadband Microwave (1–40 GHz) Dielectric Properties of Pulsed Laser Deposited Ba0.5Sr0.5TiO3 Films
by Sandwip K. Dey, Sudheendran Kooriyattil, Shojan P. Pavunny, Ram S. Katiyar and Guru Subramanyam
Crystals 2021, 11(8), 852; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11080852 - 22 Jul 2021
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2229
Abstract
Ba0.5Sr0.5TiO3 (BST-0.5) thin films (600 nm) were deposited on single crystal MgO, SrTiO3 (STO), and LaAlO3 (LAO) substrates by pulsed laser deposition at an oxygen partial pressure of 80 mTorr and temperature of 720 °C. X-ray [...] Read more.
Ba0.5Sr0.5TiO3 (BST-0.5) thin films (600 nm) were deposited on single crystal MgO, SrTiO3 (STO), and LaAlO3 (LAO) substrates by pulsed laser deposition at an oxygen partial pressure of 80 mTorr and temperature of 720 °C. X-ray diffraction and in situ reflection high-energy electron diffraction routinely ascertained the epitaxial quality of the (100)-oriented nanocrystalline films. The broadband microwave (1–40 GHz) dielectric properties were measured using coplanar waveguide transmission line test structures. The out-of-plane relative permittivity (ε/) exhibited strong substrate-dependent dielectric (relaxation) dispersions with their attendant peaks in loss tangent (tanδ), with the former dropping sharply from tens of thousands to ~1000 by 10 GHz. Although homogeneous in-plane strain (ϵǁ), enhances ε/ with εMgOBST0.5/>εSTOBST0.5/>εLAOBST0.5/  at lower frequencies, two crossover points at 8.6 GHz and 18 GHz eventually change the trend to: εSTOBST0.5/>εLAOBST0.5/>εMgOBST0.5/. The dispersions are qualitatively interpreted using (a) theoretically calculated (T)−(ϵǁ) phase diagram for single crystal and single domain BST-0.5 film, (b) theoretically predicted ϵǁ-dependent, ε/ anomaly that does not account for frequency dependence, and (c) literature reports on intrinsic and extrinsic microstructural effects, including defects-induced inhomogeneous strain and strain gradients. From the Vendik and Zubko model, the defect parameter metric, ξs, was estimated to be 0.51 at 40 GHz for BST-0.5 film on STO. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Ferroelectrics Materials for Microwave Devices)
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12 pages, 1522 KiB  
Article
Suppression of Acoustic Resonances in BST-Based Bulk-Ceramic Varactors by Addition of Magnesium Borate
by Prannoy Agrawal, Daniel Kienemund, Dominik Walk, Stipo Matic, Nicole Bohn, Kevin Häuser, Thomas Fink, Mike Abrecht, Walter Bigler, Joachim R. Binder, Rolf Jakoby and Holger Maune
Crystals 2021, 11(7), 786; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11070786 - 06 Jul 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1907
Abstract
This work presents a method for reducing acoustic resonances in ferroelectric barium strontium titanate (BST)-based bulk ceramic varactors, which are capable of operation in high-power matching circuits. Two versions of parallel-plate varactors are manufactured here: one with pure BST and one with 10 [...] Read more.
This work presents a method for reducing acoustic resonances in ferroelectric barium strontium titanate (BST)-based bulk ceramic varactors, which are capable of operation in high-power matching circuits. Two versions of parallel-plate varactors are manufactured here: one with pure BST and one with 10 vol-% magnesium borate, Mg3B2O6 (MBO). Each varactor includes a 0.85-mm-thick ferroelectric layer. Acoustic resonances that are present in the pure BST varactor are strongly suppressed in the BST-MBO varactor and, hence, the Q-factor is increased over a wide frequency range by the addition of small amounts of a low-dielectric-constant (LDK) MBO. Although the tunability is reduced due to the presence of non-tunable MBO, the increased Q-factor extends the varactor’s availability for low-loss and high-power applications. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Ferroelectrics Materials for Microwave Devices)
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14 pages, 26996 KiB  
Article
Millimeter-Wave Reflector Based on a Ferroelectric Material with Electrical Beam Steering
by Roman Platonov, Andrey Altynnikov, Andrey Komlev, Alexei Sosunov and Andrey B. Kozyrev
Crystals 2021, 11(6), 585; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11060585 - 22 May 2021
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2377
Abstract
Millimeter waves are increasingly used in modern telecommunication systems for wireless data transmission. However, higher path loss, especially caused by non-line-of-sight scenarios, remains challenging. The design of an electrically controllable reflector for the millimeter-wave range is elaborated and presented in this manuscript. The [...] Read more.
Millimeter waves are increasingly used in modern telecommunication systems for wireless data transmission. However, higher path loss, especially caused by non-line-of-sight scenarios, remains challenging. The design of an electrically controllable reflector for the millimeter-wave range is elaborated and presented in this manuscript. The reflector design was based on distributed ferroelectric ceramic elements and could be used in a frequency range up to 100 GHz. The issue of the ferroelectric reflector impedance matching was analyzed in detail. Two possible implementations of the reflector for indoor and outdoor communication systems were considered and simulated. The prototype of the proposed reflector for an operating frequency of 60 GHz was manufactured. Both simulation and measurement results demonstrated the beam steering by the proposed ferroelectric reflector. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Ferroelectrics Materials for Microwave Devices)
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17 pages, 853 KiB  
Article
Estimation of Ferroelectric Material Properties and Phase-Shifter Design Key Parameters Influence on Its Figure of Merit for Optimization of Development Process
by Alexander Gagarin, Roman Platonov, Tatiana Legkova and Andrey Altynnikov
Crystals 2021, 11(5), 538; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11050538 - 12 May 2021
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1730
Abstract
A model of the estimation of the ferroelectric-based phase-shifter figure of merit concerning the material properties and phase-shifter design parameters is presented. The influence of ferroelectric material tunability and losses on phase-shifter characteristics are analyzed. Two approaches to phase-shifter design (transmission line and [...] Read more.
A model of the estimation of the ferroelectric-based phase-shifter figure of merit concerning the material properties and phase-shifter design parameters is presented. The influence of ferroelectric material tunability and losses on phase-shifter characteristics are analyzed. Two approaches to phase-shifter design (transmission line and band-pass filter) are considered. The review of the published results on the ferroelectric phase-shifter design was performed to approve the method proposed. Recommendations to optimize the phase-shifter development process are suggested on the basis of the elaborated model and analysis performed. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Ferroelectrics Materials for Microwave Devices)
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10 pages, 3623 KiB  
Article
Characterization and Performance Analysis of BST-Based Ferroelectric Varactors in the Millimeter-Wave Domain
by Aurelian Crunteanu, Vincent Muzzupapa, Areski Ghalem, Laure Huitema, Damien Passerieux, Caroline Borderon, Raphael Renoud and Hartmut W. Gundel
Crystals 2021, 11(3), 277; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11030277 - 11 Mar 2021
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 2228
Abstract
We present the realization and analysis of the microwave performances of interdigited varactors integrating thin ferroelectric layers of barium and strontium titanate (BaxSr1xTiO3). Devices based on ferroelectric films of different compositions (x = 0.8 [...] Read more.
We present the realization and analysis of the microwave performances of interdigited varactors integrating thin ferroelectric layers of barium and strontium titanate (BaxSr1xTiO3). Devices based on ferroelectric films of different compositions (x = 0.8 and x = 0.5) have been characterized in the millimeter-wave domain, from 200 MHz to 110 GHz. By applying different bias voltages, the tunability of the capacitance can reach up to 40% for the Ba0.8Sr0.2TiO3 composition, under relatively low applied electric fields of about 167 kV/cm. These promising characteristics allow the integration of the varactor devices in tunable antennas for a large frequency domain, from the microwaves to the millimeter waves range. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Ferroelectrics Materials for Microwave Devices)
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