Crystalline orientation of BiMnO3 thin films grown by rf-sputtering

BiMnO3 thin films were deposited by means of rf-sputtering onto [1 0 0] oriented SrTiO3 substrates. X-ray diffraction measurements revealed epitaxial growth with [0 0 l]m orientation in the monoclinic structure representation, equivalent to the [111]pc direction of the pseudocubic cationic lattice. This [0 0 l]m orientation was obtained in a wide deposition parameters range. Preliminary magnetization measurements suggest that these films do not present ferromagnetism below the bulk Curie temperature, TC=105 K.