Structural characterization of BaTiO3 thin films grown by molecular beam epitaxy

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Abstract
Epitaxialultrathin films of BaTiO 3 were prepared using molecular beam epitaxy. For the substrate, (001)-oriented SrTiO 3 single crystals were used. Controlling the growth conditions of these films as well as the semiconductor thin films, led to the successful growth of the BaTiO 3 films as single crystals, characterized by x-ray diffraction even in the ultrathin range. The ultrathin BaTiO 3 films are highly c -axis-oriented tetragonal phaselike bulk BaTiO 3 crystals. The tetragonality of the thin film crystals is much larger than bulk crystal’s. We also measured the saturated polarization (P s) of the BaTiO 3 films at temperatures ranging from room temperature to 600 ° C. The results confirmed again that the films are ferroelectric tetragonal phase crystals. Moreover, they showed that the transition temperature for the ferroelectric-paraelectric phase transition of the films is higher than bulk crystal’s.