Zinc oxide doping effects in polarization switching of lithium niobate

Abstract
We report a pulsed-field analysis on the 180° domain reversal process in Z -cut congruent grown lithium niobate ( LiNbO 3 ) doped with zinc oxide at concentration C ZnO >5 mol %. The polarization switching field is found to decrease with the ZnO doping with a threshold (E th ) and internal (E int ) field as low as 2.5 and 0.5 kV/mm, respectively, resultant on 8 mol % ZnO doped LiNbO 3 . The substantial decrease of E th and E int is ascribed to the suppression of nonstoichiometric point defects by the substitution of Zn 2+ ions in the lattice site.