High-resolution calorimetric study of Pb(Mg(1/3)Nb(2/3))O3 single crystal

Phys Rev Lett. 2012 Jul 20;109(3):037601. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.109.037601. Epub 2012 Jul 16.

Abstract

Motivated by the long-standing unresolved enigma of the relaxor ferroelectric ground state, we performed a high-resolution heat capacity and polarization study of the field-induced phase transition in the relaxor ferroelectric single crystal Pb(Mg(1/3)Nb(2/3))O3 (PMN) oriented along the [110] direction. We show that the discontinuous evolution of polarization as a function of the electric field or temperature is a consequence of a true first order transition from a glassy to ferroelectric state, which is accompanied by an excess heat capacity anomaly and released latent heat. We also find that in a zero field there is no ferroelectric phase transition in bulk PMN at any temperature, indicating that the nonergodic dipolar glass phase persists down to the lowest temperatures.