Kibble-Zurek Scaling Study of Phase Transition in Barium Titanate (BaTiO₃)

Far-from-equilibrium phenomena are some of the grand challenges of modern material science. Perovskite materials and their defect structures play an important role in a variety of solid-state devices. The understanding of non-equilibrium physics in the vicinity of symmetry-breaking phase transformations has progressed on many fronts, from scaling properties of dynamical correlation functions to the Kibble-Zurek (KZ) scaling behavior. By quenching the bulk single crystals of BaTiO₃ at different rates through the ferroelectric phase transition, we see that defect density and the domain size distribution follows the KZ scaling law. Simulated Diffuse Neutron Scattering studies were also carried out to further study the scaling behavior.