A comparative study of fibre-textured and epitaxial Nb-doped Pb(Zr0.53Ti0.47)O3 thin films on different substrates

Fibre-textured and epitaxial Nb-doped Pb(Zr0.53Ti0.47)O-3 (PNZT) thin films were grown on the different substrates by a sol-gel process. The [100]- and [111]-fibre-textured polycrystalline PNZT films were obtained on platinized silicon substrates by introducing PbO and TiO2 seeding layers, while the [001]- and [111]-oriented epitaxial PNZT films were formed directly on Nb-doped SrTiO3 (Nb:STO) single-crystal substrates with (100) and (111) surfaces, respectively. The preferential orientation and phase structure of the fibre-textured and epitaxial PNZT films, as well as their influences on the electrical properties were investigated. Higher remnant polarization (P-r) and piezoelectric coefficient (d(33)) were obtained for the epitaxial PNZT films on Nb:STO substrates than that for the fibre-textured ones on platinized silicon substrates. For both fibre-textured and epitaxial cases, the PNZT films with [100]/[001] orientations show higher piezoelectric responses than [111]-oriented ones, whereas better ferroelectric properties can be obtained in the latter. The intrinsic and extrinsic contributions were discussed to explain the difference in electrical properties for differently oriented fibre-textured and epitaxial PNZT films on different substrates. (C) 2010Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.