Effect of substrate temperature on microstructures and dielectric properties of compositionally graded BST thin films

Compositionally graded Ba1-xSrxTiO3 (BST) (x = 0-0.3) thin films were prepared on Pt/Ti/SiO2/Si substrate at different substrate temperatures ranging from 550 °C to 650 °C by radio-frequency (rf) magnetron sputtering. The effect of substrate temperature on the preferential orientation, microstructures and dielectric properties of compositionally graded BST thin films was investigated by X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy and dielectric frequency spectra, respectively. As the temperature increases, the preferential orientation evolves in the order: randomly orientation→ (111)→ highly oriented (111) (α(111) = 60.2%). The surface roughness of the graded BST thin films varies with the substrate temperatures. No visible internal interface in the compositionally graded thin films can be observed in the cross-sectional SEM images. The graded BST thin films deposited at 650 °C possess the highest dielectric constant and dielectric loss, which are 408 and 0.013, respectively.