Epitaxial thin films of PbZr0.52Ti0.48O3 (PZT) were synthesized successfully on SrRuO3/SrTiO3/MgO/TiN/Si heterostructures by pulsed laser deposition. The films were single phase and had (001) orientation. The deposition parameters were varied to obtain the best epitaxial layer for each of the compounds. Transmission electron microscopy indicated good epitaxy for the entire heterostructure and sharp interfaces between the epilayers. Dielectric and P–E hysteresis loop measurements were carried out with evaporated Ag electrodes. The dielectric constant for the films was found to be between 400–450. The value of saturation polarization Ps was between 55–60 μC/cm2, and the coercive field Ec varied from 60–70 kV/cm. Integration of PZT films with silicon will be useful for future memory and micromechanical devices.

Nanocrystalline nickel particles were embedded in amorphous alumina and crystalline TiN matrices using a pulsed laser deposition process to investigate the effect of texturing on magnetic properties of nickel nanocrystallites. The crystalline quality of both the matrix and magnetic particles was investigated by cross-sectional high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. The embedded Ni nanocrystals were found to be epitaxial in the case of the TiN matrix and polycrystalline in Al2O3 amorphous matrix. The Ni nanocrystals on TiN/Si grow epitaxially because the TiN acting as a template grows epitaxially on Si substrate via domain epitaxy. On the other hand, Ni nanocrystals in the Al2O3 matrix are polycrystalline because of the amorphous nature of the alumina matrix. Magnetization versus temperature measurements have shown that the blocking temperature, above which the samples lose magnetization–field (M–H) hysteretic behavior, of the Ni–TiN sample (approximately 190 K) is significantly higher than that of Ni–Al2O3 sample (approximately 30 K) with a similar size distribution of embedded magnetic particles. A comparison of the values of coercivity (Hc) of the two samples, measured from M–H data, indicates that epitaxial Ni nanocrystals also exhibit significantly higher coercivity than polycrystalline Ni particles in amorphous alumina matrix. The high values of TB and Hc of Ni–TiN samples with respect to TB of N–A12O3 samples are believed to be associated with preferred alignment of nanocrystallites.

We have investigated the diffusion characteristics of Cu in nanocrystalline, polycrystalline and single crystal TiN thin films, which are being used as a diffusion barrier for sub-quarter-micron metallization. These films were synthesized on Si (100) substrate by first ablating TiN and then ablating Cu targets using Pulse Laser Deposition technique. The three different microstructures of TiN were achieved by growing the films at different substrate temperatures, where higher temperatures (650 °C) leads to epitaxy. Then a uniform thin layer of Cu was deposited on TiN/Si substrate at room temperature for all the three depositions above. These structures were characterized using X-Ray diffraction technique and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. Each sample is then annealed at 500 °C for 30min to study the diffusion barrier characteristics as a function of microstructure of TiN. Study of diffusion profile and Cu concentration measurement were performed using Scanning Transmission Electron Microscopy-Z contrast Imaging (0.12nm resolution), Electron Energy Loss Spectroscopy and Secondary Ion Mass Spectroscopy. From the results obtained the effect of microstructure of TiN thin films on the diffusion characteristics of Cu after annealing was analyzed. Four points probe resistivity measurements were made to establish structure property correlations.

Epitaxial thin films of PbZr0.52Ti0.48O3 (PZT) have been synthesized successfully on SrRuO3/SrTiO3/MgO/TiN/Si heterostructures by pulsed laser deposition. The films were single phase and had (001) orientation. The deposition parameters were varied to obtain the best epitaxial layer for each of the compounds. Transmission electron microscopy indicated good epitaxy for the entire heterostructure and sharp interfaces between the epilayers. Dielectric and P-E hysteresis loop measurements were carried out with evaporated Ag electrodes. The dielectric constant for the films was found to be between 400-450. The value of saturation polarization Ps, was between 55-60 νC/cm2 and the coercive field Ec varied from 60-70 kV/cm. Integration of PZT films with silicon will be useful for future memory and micromechanical devices.

We have been successful in the fabrication of (001) oriented epitaxial PZT films on YBCO/SrTiO3/MgO/TiN/Si heterostructures by pulsed laser deposition. The films were observed to be single phase by X-ray diffraction. The deposition parameters were varied to obtain the best epitaxial layer for each of the compounds. Transmission electron microscopy was employed for understanding of the structure, crystallinity and interfaces for each of these epilayers. Dielectric and P-E hysteresis loop measurements were carried out with evaporated Ag electrodes. The dielectric constant for the films was found to be around 380–400. The value of saturation polarization Ps was between 40–50 μC/cm2 and the coercive field Ec varied from 45–55 kV/cm. Integration of PZT films with silicon will be useful for future memory and micromechanical devices.