Formation of PbTiO3 thin films on seed layers using DC magnetron layer-by-layer deposition

Lead titanate thin films were produced without and with seed layers on platinized silicon substrates by reactive DC magnetron layer-by-layer sputter-deposition on high (350-700 °C) temperature substrates. To achieve perovskite PbTiO3 phase the films after deposition were annealed in an oxygen atmosphere (1.33 Pa) at 600 °C temperature. The surface morphological, structural and ferroelectric properties of the lead titanate thin films were studied by x-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, optical microscopy and polarization-electric field (P-E) measurements. The results show that Ti (5 nm) and Ti/TiO2 (5 nm) seed layers change the nucleation density and therefore change the morphology, crystal structure, adhesion and ferroelectric properties. The best results were obtained using Ti/TiO2 seed layers. These seed layers increase the density of nucleation centers of growing thin films and therefore increase the density of grains, decrease crystal sizes and increase tetragonality up to 1.057 and remnant polarization up to 25 μC/cm2.