Preparation of epitaxial ABO3 perovskite-type oxide thin films on a (100)MgAl2O4/Si substrate

Abstract

Epitaxial thin films of ABO3 perovskite-type oxides, including PbTiO3, (Pb0.90La0.10) (Zr0.65Ti0.35)0.975O3,BaTiO3, and SrTiO3, have been successfully obtained by rf magnetron sputtering on (100)Si substrate with an intermediate epitaxial layer of MgAl2O4. Only PbTiO3 grew in the tetragonal crystal structure and other materials grew in the cubic structure. The unit axis direction of the perovskite-type oxide films was coincident with that of the underlying MgAl2O4 films. The tetragonal PbTiO3 films were a mixture of c and a domain. The preferred orientation of the tetragonal PbTiO3 film, that is c to a domain volume ratio, could be controlled by the conditions of sample cooling after the deposition. Highly c-axis oriented films, which consisted of more than 90% c domains, were produced by cooling the sample at a high cooling rate, typically 30 °C/min, and by maintaining an rf plasma during cooling. The mechanism of the preferred orientation of PbTiO3 film has been explained by a balance of compressive stress due to a self-bias effect and tensile stress due to the lattice mismatch and due to the lattice anisotropy of tetragonal PbTiO3.