Exquisite control of the Landau energy landscape in ferroelectric HZO

HZO – (Hf,Zr)O₂ -- has emerged as a promising ferroelectric material for low-power microelectronics with robust polarization switching in films as thin as 10 nm. As such, it is highly desirable to further improve the performance of HZO through engineering of its chemical and physical properties. To date, the polarization switching behavior has eluded theoretical description, with polarization barriers predicted by Density Functional Theory (DFT) being much larger than experimental measurements.

Herein, we investigate the polarization switching mechanism in HZO using DFT calculations and phenomenological modelling. We consider the influence of structural defects, vacancies, and strain to elucidate the chemical and structural factors influencing the polarization switching energy landscape and compare to recent experiments.