Welcome to Ceramics Laboratory

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Research and education at our laboratory are centered on science and technology of functional ceramics. We focus on piezoelectrics and ferroelectrics, polar materials, paraelectrics, high-K dielectrics, ferromagnetics, and ferroelastics. We are interested in fundamental mechanisms, theory and modeling, processing and fabrication of thin films and bulk ceramics, structural and functional properties, device design, fabrication and testing of functional ceramics.

We identify and aim to clarify fundamental questions that are potential drivers of novel electroceramic-technology and its applications in areas relevant to society needs. In another major direction we demonstrate / aim to demonstrate concepts for new applications of electroceramics in fields such as information and communication technologies, medical instrumentation and industrial process monitoring.

 

Distinctions


News


muraltPaul Muralt awarded

Paul Muralt is the 2016 C. B. Sayer Memorial Awardee of the UFFC Frequency Control Society.


Work of Igor Stolichnov highlighted

The paper Bent Ferroelectric Domain Walls as Reconfigurable Metallic-Like Channels has been highlighted in the journals Nature Reviews.


Konstantin Shapovalov and Sina Hashemi Zadeh Awarded

Konstantin Shapovalov and Sina Hashemi Zadeh won the two Best Poster Awards at Ferroelectrics Workshop (Leysin 2015).


muraltPaul Muralt - Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE

Paul Muralt was nominated The Distinguished Lecturer of the IEEE Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics and Frequency Control Society for 2016-17.


muraltWork of Jin Wang highlighted

The paper Negative-pressure induced enhancements in a freestanding ferroelectric has been highlighted in the journals Physics Today and Science.


boBo Jiang awarded

Bo Jiang received the 2015 ABB Award for his thesis “Ceramics based technologies for high-temperature micro-reactors”.


anandLeo McGilly awarded

Leo McGilly won the "Best young researcher presenter" award at the TOPO International Workshop for his presentation on "Velocity control of domain walls by top electrode modification in ferroelectric thin film capacitors".


anandAnand Chandrasekaran awarded

Anand Chandrasekaran won the Best Poster Award in the CSF Conference for his poster "Defect ordering and defect-domain wall interactions in PbTiO3 : A first-principles study".


petrPetr Bednyakov Awarded

Petr won the Domain-Wall Workshop (Leysin 2014) Best Oral Presentation Award for his talk on "Controlled formation of charged feroelectric domain walls".


setterMahamudu Mtebwa Awarded

Mahamudu won the Domain-Wall Workshop (Leysin 2014) Best Poster Award for his presentation on "Induced Self Ordering of Domain Patterns in Epitaxial Rhombohedral PZT thin Films".


setterLeo McGilly Awarded

Leo McGilly won the ECAPD 2014 Young Scientist Award for his oral presentation "Controlling ferroelectric domain wall motion".


setterMahamudu Mtebwa Awarded

Mahamudu Mtebwa won the ECAPD 2014 Young Scientist Award for his poster presentation on "PLD growth and domain patterns of highly tetragonal epitaxial PZT (110) thin films".


setterThe work of Alexander Tagantsev and Petr Yudin highlighted

The paper "Influence of flexoelectric coupling on domain patterns in ferroelectrics" is highlighted by the PRB editors.

setterRobert B. Sosman Award Lecture

Nava Setter delivered the 2013 Robert B. Sosman Award Lecture of the American Ceramics Society.


Anand Chandrasekaran awarded

Anand Chandrasekaran won the Best Poster Award of the EDMX Research Day for his poster "Defects and domain walls in doped PZT".

 


setterNava Setter awarded

Nava Setter received the "AVS Recognition for Excellence in Leadership" from the AVS Society and the 2013 "FMA International Award" of the FMA Meetings.


muraltPaul Muralt - Fellow of IEEE

Paul Muralt was elevated to the grade of IEEE Fellow with the citation: "for contributions to piezoelectric microelectromechanical systems".

 

jin_wangBest Paper Award

The paper "Origins of Electro-Mechanical Coupling in Polycrystalline Ferroelectrics During Subcoercive Electrical Loading" co-authored by Dragan Damjanovic was given the 2012 Edward C. Henry Best Paper Award by the American Ceramic Society.


jin_wangPetr Yudin awarded

Petr Yudin received the "best oral presentation award" in the IFDS'2012 for his talk "Elastic effects and structural changes in 180-degree ferroelectric domain walls".


jin_wangJin Wang awarded

Jin Wang is the awardee of the 2012 Prof. René Wasserman Prize for his thesis "Ferroelectric Nanowires: An Investigation in Synthesis, Characterization, Functionality, and Modeling of Finite Size Effects". The citation reads "For a wide scope and original research on the synthesis and characterization of piezoelectric nano-wires of the perovskite family and the theoretical and experimental study of their functionality".
DOI:10.5075/epfl-thesis-4914


setterNava Setter awarded

Nava Setter is the 2011 Buessem Award Recipient. The award is given annually by the US Center for Dielectric Studies to a member of the dielectrics community with a lifetime of achievement in the field.


mikheevEvgeny Mikheev awarded

Evgeny Mikheev received the Award for the 2011 Best Master Project of the EPFL Materials Science and Engineering Program for his project "Magnetotransport in Ultrathin (Ga,Mn)As Channels Controlled by a Ferroelectric Gate".


milyutinCongratulations to Evgeny Milyutin

Congratulations to Evgeny Milyutin for receiving a 2011 EPFL INNOGRANT aiming to support him in developing his company AZBOOKA which will provide online assistance of maths for school kids.


nava.setterNava Setter awarded

Nava Setter won the 2011 'IEEE-UFFC' Achievement Award, which is the highest distinction of the Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control Society.


Maxim Gureev awarded

Maxim Gureev is one of the two winners of the best presentation award in the 2nd TokyoTech - EDMX Workshop on Materials that has been held in Chateau d'Oex 13-16.3.2011.


lc_logoCeramics Laboratory awarded ERC Advanced Grant

The ERC Advanced Grant was given for the project "Exploring Mobile Interfaces: Domain Walls as Functional Elements".


Dragan Damjanovic - Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE

Dragan Damjanovic serves this year as The Distinguished Lecturer for the IEEE Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics and Frequency Control Society. His lecture is entitled "Piezoelectric materials - microscopic mechanisms, novel compositions and advanced applications".


stolichnovA paper of Igor Stolichnov highlighted

A paper of Igor Stolichnov et al "Enhanced Curie temperature and nonvolatile switching of ferromagnetism in ultrathin (Ga,Mn)As channels", is highlighted as Editor Suggestion in PRB Journal.
Download the paper (.pdf)


lijinLi Jin awarded

Li Jin is one of the winners of the 2010 Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Students Abroad.

 


mikheevEugene Mikheev awarded

Eugene Mikheev is one of the winers of the 'best poster awards' in the International Symposium on Applications of Ferroelectrics (ISAF-2010) for his poster on "Polarization screening in multiferroic (Ga,Mn)As/P(VDF-TrFE) transistors".


wangjinJin Wang awarded

Jin Wang is one of the winers of the 'best poster awards' in the International Conference on Ceramic Processing Science on (ICCPS-11) for his poster on "Monocrystalline PbZrxTi1-xO3 nanowires: fabrication and properties".


The work of Dragan Damjanovic highlighted

The work of Dragan Damjanovic "A morphotropic phase boundary system based on polarization rotation and polarization extension" is featured as a research highlight at the main web-site of Applied Physics Letters.


wangjinJin Wang awarded

Jin Wang is one of the winners of the 2009 Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Students Abroad.

Thin-film-specific elastic effects in ferroelectric domain structures

Konstantin Shapovalov successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


Experimental and first-principles study of point defects, domain walls, and their interactions in ferroelectrics

Anand Chandrasekaran successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


Velocity Control of 180° Domain Walls in Ferroelectric Films

Leo McGilly et al. showed velocity control of 180°domain walls by electrode modification.
DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.5b02798


Towards room-temperature deterministic ferroelectric control of ferromagnetic thin films

Zhen Huang successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


Bent Ferroelectric Domain Walls as Reconfigurable Metallic-Like Channels

Igor Stolichnov et al demonstrated and explained metallic conduction in nominally uncharged, bent, rewritable ferroelectric domain-walls in PZT.
DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.5b03450


Negative-pressure induced enhancements in a freestanding ferroelectric

Jin Wang et al realized negative pressure on ferroelectric nano wires resulting in a strong enhancement in Curie temperature and spontaneous polarization.
doi: 10.1038/nmat4365


Reconfigurable doping in a ferroelectric wide-bandgap semiconductor

Arnaud Crassous et al. showed creation and nanoscale manipulation of charged walls in ferroelectric films and their action as real-time dopant activators.
doi: 10.1038/nnano.2015.114


Monocrystalline PZT thin films: Towards controlled growth and controlled domain patterns

Mahamudu Mtebwa successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


Controlling domain wall motion in ferroelectric thin films

Leo McGilly et al. shows the controlled propagation of domain walls in ferroelectric films.
doi:10.1038/nnano.2014.320


In search of ferroelectricity in antiferroelectric lead zirconate

Kaushik Vaideeswaran successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


Breaking of macroscopic centric symmetry in paraelectric phases of ferroelectric materials and implications for flexoelectricity

Alberto Biancoli et al. show that the large electro-mechanical response seen in paraelectric phases of ferroelectric perovskites can be induced by macroscopic symmetry breaking due to high-temperature processing. DOI: 10.1038/NMAT4139


kvasovElastic Coupling between Nonferroelastic Domain Walls

Konstantin Shapovalov et al. revealed, in ferroelectric thin films, a strong elastic interaction between nonferroelastic domain walls that are apart at distances comparable to the film thickness. PRL 113, 207601 (2014).


kvasovAdvanced sol-gel processing of PZT thin films for piezoelectric MEMS structures

Nachiappan Chidamba- ram successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


kvasovBreaking of the macroscopic centric symmetry in Ba1-xSrxTiO3 ceramics and single crystals

Alberto Biancoli successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


kvasovPZT thin films for MEMS devices: From in-situ sputter deposition to energy harvesting device.

Andrea Mazzalai successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


kvasovControlled stripes of ultra fine ferroelectric domains

Ludwig Feigl et al. demonstrate in theory and practice controlled stripes of ≈10 nm wide domains that extend in one direction along tens of micrometres.
doi: 10.1038/ncomms5677


kvasovHigh-order electromechanical couplings in ferroelectrics

Alexander Kvasov successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


jin_wangDragan Damjanovic - VP Ferroelectrics

Dragan Damjanovic was appointed Vice President for Ferroelectrics at the UFFC-IEEE Society.


monikaGrowth and properties of AlScN thin films for microwave transducers and piezoelectric energy harvesting

Ramin Matloub successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


Ferroelectric translational antiphase boundaries in nonpolar materials

Xiankui Wei et al. showed ferroelectricity in translational anti phase boundaries of the non-polar antiferroelectric PbZrO3.

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms4031


Book: Tuneable Film Bulk Acoustic Wave Resonators

The book "Tuneable Film Bulk Acoustic Wave Resonators" by S. Gevorgian, A. Tagantsev, and A. Vorobiev appeared in print (Springer).


The origin of antiferroelectricity in PbZrO3

Alexander Tagantsev et al showed that the antiferroelectric PbZrO3 is a missed incommensurate phase and its appearance is driven by flexoelectric coupling.

doi:10.1038/ncomms3229


sluka_paperFree-electron gas at charged domain walls in insulating BaTiO3

Tomas Sluka et al. showed metallic, quasi-2DEG conductivity in charged domain walls of the classical ferroelectric insulator BaTiO3.

doi:10.1038/ncomms2839


monikaDomain wall conduction in bismuth ferrite thin films

Monika Iwanowska successfully defended her thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


stolichnovMER Igor Stolichnov

Igor Stolichnov was awarded the title of EPFL senior scientist (MER - Maître d'enseignement et de recherché).


yan_yanMaterial Study of Micromachined Thin Film Solid Oxide Fuel Cells

Yan Yan successfully defended her thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.


sluka_paperEnhanced Electromechanical Response of Ferroelectrics Due to Charged Domain Walls

Tomas Sluka et al. demonstrated a new mechanism leading to a strong enhancement of piezoelectric properties. It clarifies the so-far unexplained effect of high domain-wall density on macroscopic properties of domain-engineered ferroelectrics.

doi:10.1038/ncomms1751


gureev_defMacroscopic Theory of Charged Domain Walls in Ferroelectrics

Maxim Gureev successfully defended his thesis and was awarded the grade of PhD.
doi:10.5075/epfl-thesis-5303


stolichnov_paperCold-Field Switching in PVDF-TrFE Ferroelectric Polymer Nanomesas

A study of Igor Stolichnov et al. on ferroelectric nanomesas of PVDF suggests that there is no fundamental bar for lowering the coercive field in ferroelectric polymer nanostructures (of importance in micro- nanoelectronics).
Doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.027603


2nd International Workshop on Piezoelectric MEMS

The workshop, chaired by Paul Muralt will be held on September 6-7 at the EPFL (Hall CM3). http://www.piezomems2011.org/index.html


Book: Domains in Ferroic Crystals and Thin Films

The book "Domains in Ferroic Crystals and Thin Films" by Alexander Tagantsev, Eric L Cross, and Jan Fousek appeared in print (Springer).