Strongly coupled phase transition in ferroelectric/correlated electron oxide heterostructures

We fabricated ultrathin ferroelectric/correlated electron oxide heterostructures composed of the ferroelectric Pb(Zr_0.2Ti_0.8)O₃ and the correlated electron oxide (CEO) La_0.8Sr_0.2MnO₃ on SrTiO₃ substrates by pulsed laser epitaxy. The hole accumulation in the ultrathin CEO layer was substantially modified by heterostructuring with the ferroelectric layer, resulting in an insulator-metal transition. In particular, our thickness dependent study showed that drastic changes in transport and magnetic properties were strongly coupled to the modulation of charge carriers by ferroelectric field effect, which was confined to the vicinity of the interface. Thus, our results provide crucial evidence that strong ferroelectric field effect control can be achieved in ultrathin (10 nm) heterostructures, yielding at least a 100 000-fold change in resistivity.