Time and frequency-dependence of the electric field-induced phase transition in BaTiO₃-BiZn_1/2Ti_1/2O₃

The time and frequency dependence of the electric field-induced phase transition in BaTiO₃-BiZn_1/2Ti_1/2O₃ was studied using in situ X-ray diffraction. The kinetics of the field-induced phase transition between cubic and tetragonal phases was described using a modified Kolmogorov-Avrami-Ishibashi (KAI) equation. Unlike previous works, for which some assumptions (e.g., unimodal and Gaussian) on the distribution of transition rates are needed, the present work utilized Bayesian inference and a Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm to obtain the distribution of transition rates empirically without a priori assumption on the distribution. The results show that the transition rate coefficient increases as the frequency of applied field increases. The mean value of exponent n in the modified-KAI equation was close to 1, implying that the field-induced phase transition is site saturated and the growth of the induced phase occurred primarily from the surface.