C-axis oriented ferroelectric thin films of Si-substituted PbTiO3 on Si(100) by pulsed laser deposition:: Boost for nonvolatile memory application

It has been demonstrated that Si substitution in a PbTiO3 target helps to avoid the formation of a pyrochlore phase, which otherwise occurs during fabrication of the films directly on Si(100) by the pulsed laser deposition technique. The films are perfectly c-axis oriented. Moreover, the ferroelectric properties of PbTiO3 are not affected by Si substitution. As silicon helps the realization of the films at low substrate temperature, the Pb/Ti ratio is maintained close to 1 and the loss factor tan delta in the range of 0.02-0.05. Thus, the integration of nonvolatile ferroelectric random access memory on semiconductors is shown to be possible in a reliable, cost effective, and simple manner. (C) 1998 American Institute of Physics. [S0003-6951 (98)01508-3].