Low-frequency dielectric relaxation of BaTiO3 thin-film capacitors

Ferroelectric BaTiO3 thin films with perovskite structure were grown by sol-gel spin-on processing onto (111)Pt/Ti/SiO2/Si substrates. In order to investigate the effects of space charge in BaTiO3 thin films, we measured the relative dielectric constant and the ac conductivity of the films as a function of frequency, ac oscillation amplitude, and temperature. Dielectric constant and dielectric loss were 147 and 0.03 at 100 kHz, respectively. Also, BaTiO3 thin films exhibited marked dielectric relaxation above the Curie temperature and in the low-frequency region below 100 Hz. This low-frequency dielectric relaxation is attributed to the ionized space-charge carriers such as oxygen vacancies and defects in BaTiO3 film and the interfacial polarization. The thermal activation energy for the relaxation process of the ionized space-charge carriers was 0.72 eV. (C) 1999 American Institute of Physics. [S0003-6951(99)01038-4].