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Measurement of a solid-state triple point at the metal–insulator transition in VO2

Nature volume 500, pages 431–434 (2013)Cite this article

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Abstract

First-order phase transitions in solids are notoriously challenging to study. The combination of change in unit cell shape, long range of elastic distortion and flow of latent heat leads to large energy barriers resulting in domain structure, hysteresis and cracking. The situation is worse near a triple point, where more than two phases are involved. The well-known metal–insulator transition in vanadium dioxide1, a popular candidate for ultrafast optical and electrical switching applications, is a case in point. Even though VO2 is one of the simplest strongly correlated materials, experimental difficulties posed by the first-order nature of the metal–insulator transition as well as the involvement of at least two competing insulating phases have led to persistent controversy about its nature1,2,3,4. Here we show that studying single-crystal VO2 nanobeams5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16 in a purpose-built nanomechanical strain apparatus allows investigation of this prototypical phase transition with unprecedented control and precision. Our results include the striking finding that the triple point of the metallic phase and two insulating phases is at the transition temperature, Ttr = Tc, which we determine to be 65.0 ± 0.1 °C. The findings have profound implications for the mechanism of the metal–insulator transition in VO2, but they also demonstrate the importance of this approach for mastering phase transitions in many other strongly correlated materials, such as manganites17 and iron-based superconductors18.

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Figure 1: Control of the metal–insulator transition in VO2 using uniaxial stress.
Figure 2: Temperature and length dependence in coexistence.
Figure 3: Resistance–length measurements.
Figure 4: Phase diagram of VO2.

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Acknowledgements

We thank B. Spivak, A. Levanyuk and J. Wei for discussions. The silicon chips were patterned at the University of Washington Microfabrication Facility and the Nanofabrication Facility at the University of California, Santa Barbara. This work was supported by the US Department of Energy, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Division of Materials Sciences and Engineering, award DE-SC0002197.

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  1. Department of Physics, University of Washington, Seattle, 98195, Washington, USA

    Jae Hyung Park, Jim M. Coy, T. Serkan Kasirga, Chunming Huang, Zaiyao Fei, Scott Hunter & David H. Cobden

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Contributions

All authors performed measurements and device fabrication. J.H.P. and J.M.C. designed and constructed the apparatus. D.H.C. conceived and directed the experiments. D.H.C. and J.H.P. wrote the paper.

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Correspondence to David H. Cobden.

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Park, J., Coy, J., Kasirga, T. et al. Measurement of a solid-state triple point at the metal–insulator transition in VO2. Nature 500, 431–434 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature12425

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