New Approach to Analysis of the Switching Current Data, Recorded During Conventional Hysteresis Measurements

The explanation of fatigue as a spatially non-uniform kinetic imprint due to evolution of the local threshold field distribution function has been proposed by us recently. In this paper we propose a new switching current analysis which allows to extract the distribution function from the data of conventional hysteresis loop measurements. Domain kinetics in slow-increasing field in spatially inhomogeneous ferroelectric was investigated by computer simulation. Domain arising and growth were considered under assumption that the threshold field for appearance of isolated nuclei is essentially higher than for nuclei at the domain wall. The obtained approach essentially differs from Preisach one. The proposed method has been applied for analysis of the switching current data measured during fatigue cycling in PZT and PLZT thin films. The fitting formula for dependence of switching charge and current maximum on the cycle number has been proposed and successively used for experimental data. The proposed method can accelerate the fatigue testing.