Polarons formation in Bi-deficient BaBiO3

W. ROMAN ACEVEDO; S. DI NAPOLI; F. ROMANO; G. RODRIGUEZ RUIZ; D. RUBI; V. VILDOSOLA

PHYSICAL REVIEW B

AMER PHYSICAL SOC

Lugar: New York; Año: 2021

1098-0121

BaBiO3 is a charged ordered Peierls-like perovskite well known for its superconducting properties upon K or Pb doping. We present a study on the transport and electronic properties of BaBiO3 perovskite with strong Bi-deficiency. We show that it is possible to synthesize BaBiO3 thin layers with Bi-vacancies above 8-10% by depositing an yttrium-stabilized zirconia capping layer. By combining transport measurements with ab initio calculations we propose an scenario where the Bi-vacancies give rise to the formation of polarons and suggest that the electrical transport is dominated by the migration of these polarons trapped at Bi3+ sites. Our work shows that cation vacancies engineering -hardly explored to date- appears as a promising pathway to tune the electronic and functional properties of perovskites.