Abstract
The increasing demand for higher operating speeds and greater integration densities in electronic devices has made heat dissipation one of the most critical challenges for next-generation technologies. This challenge has driven extensive efforts aimed at achieving a giant electrocaloric effect in ferroelectrics for high-efficiency cooling. Here, we propose a defect dipole engineering strategy to manipulate the polarization behavior of ferroelectric ceramics, leading to superior electrocaloric effect. By incorporating Sm and Li ions, the (Sm(Ba)̇-Li(Ba)') defect dipoles enhance the polarizability of BaTiO(3). Simultaneously, these dipole defects increase the carrier activation energy, effectively mitigating the inherent trade-off between high breakdown strength and high polarization, thereby allowing the application of a high electric field to fully activate the electrocaloric potential. As a result, defect dipole engineering enables BaTiO(3) to achieve a remarkable electrocaloric effect over a wide temperature range, achieving a high temperature change of 2.7 K at 70 °C- typical for integrated circuits.