Electric-field-tunable mechanical properties of relaxor ferroelectric single crystal measured by nanoindentation

Electric field dependent mechanical properties of relaxor ferroelectric material Pb(Mn_1/3Nb_2/3)O₃-PbTiO₃ are investigated with the nanoindentation technique. Giant electric-field-tunable apparent elastic modulus (up to -39%), hardness (-9% to 20%), and energy dissipation (up to -13%) are reported. Based on experimental data, a characterization method of electromechanical coupled nanoindentation is proposed. In this method, an electric field tunable scaling relationship among elastic modulus, hardness, and indentation work for ferroelectric materials can be determined. In addition, this method can be used to obtain the electric-field-dependent elastic modulus and hardness, and avoid the estimate of contact area in the Oliver-Pharr method. Finally, the different effects on elastic modulus between positive and negative electric fields can be explained by the flexoelectric effect.