Size effects in the structural phase transition of VO₂ nanoparticles

We have observed size effects in the structural phase transition of submicron vanadium dioxide precipitates in silica. The VO₂ nanoprecipitates are produced by the stoichiometric coimplantation of vanadium and oxygen and subsequent thermal processing. The observed size dependence in the transition temperature and hysteresis loops of the semiconductor-to-metal phase transition in VO₂ is described in terms of heterogeneous nucleation statistics with a phenomenological approach in which the density of nucleating defects is a power function of the driving force.