Improved Leakage Behavior at High Temperature via Engineering of Ferroelectric Sandwich Structures

The leakage behavior of ferroelectric film has an important effect on energy storage characteristics. Understanding and controlling the leakage mechanism of ferroelectric film at different temperatures can effectively improve its wide-temperature storage performance. Here, the structures of a 1 mol% SiO₂-doped BaZr_0.35Ti_0.65O₃ (BZTS) layer sandwiched between two undoped BaZr_0.35Ti_0.65O₃ (BZT35) layers was demonstrated, and the leakage mechanism was analyzed compared with BZT35 and BZTS single-layer film. It was found that interface-limited conduction of Schottky (S) emission and the Fowler-Nordheim (F-N) tunneling existing in BZT35 and BZTS films under high temperature and a high electric field are the main source of the increase of leakage current and the decrease of energy storage efficiency at high temperature. Only an ohmic conductive mechanism exists in the whole temperature range of BZT35/BZTS/BZT35(1:1:1) sandwich structure films, indicating that sandwich multilayer films can effectively simulate the occurrence of interface-limited conductive mechanisms and mention the energy storage characteristics under high temperature.