An Original Positive-Up-Negative-Down Protocol for Electrical Characterization of Antiferroelectric Materials

Abstract

This work introduces the AFE-PUND measurement method, an original positive up negative down (PUND) protocol intended to accurately study antiferroelectric (AFE) thin-film behavior. As for its FE counterpart, the AFE-PUND method isolates switching currents from nonswitching contributions, enabling a precise extraction of saturation polarization and coercive fields from hysteresis loop curves. In this paper, AFE-PUND was deployed on AFE ZrO₂ films of varying thicknesses. The results reveal that saturation polarization increases with film thickness, indicating enhanced domain stability, while endurance cycles showcase the wake-up effect and its eventual fatigue-induced degradation in thicker films. Similarly, coercive fields decrease with thickness, reflecting reduced switching barriers and a sharper transition between the tetragonal and orthorhombic phases. AFE-PUND establishes itself as an extremely valuable method for advancing the understanding and optimization of AFE materials.

Keywords: Antiferroelectricity; Electrical characterization; Hafnium oxide; PUND; ZrO2.