Switching Properties: Basic Methods and Characteristics

Abstract

We approach one of the main issues of the investigations of ferroics: their properties conditioned by dynamic domain phenomena. It is these properties that play the decisive role in many recent applications. But before entering this subject in Chap. 8, we wish to describe experimental methods used for obtaining integral data about such phenomena. We have in mind the data that reflect domain wall motion and other mechanisms involved in the processes in which a ferroic sample changes its domain state under the action of external forces. These mechanisms involve possible nucleation of new domains, growth of nucleated or of already existing domains, and their coalescence. Such integral data provide the basic information on characteristics of the switching process as a whole, like its speed, its dependence on the applied force, on the boundary conditions, or on temperature.