On growth of epitaxial vanadium oxide thin film on sapphire (0001)

We report the characteristics of epitaxial growth and properties of vanadium oxide (VO2) thin films on sapphire (0001) substrates. Pulsed laser deposition was used to grow (002) oriented VO2 films on sapphire (0001). Transmission electron microscopy studies showed that the orientation relationship between the substrate and the thin film is: (002)(f2)parallel to(0006)(sub3) and [010](f2) parallel to[2 (1) over bar(1) over bar0](sub). It was also established that VO2 has three different orientations in the film plane which are rotated by 60 degrees from each other. The epitaxial growth of vanadium oxide on sapphire (0001) has been explained in the framework of domain matching epitaxy (DME). Electrical resistivity measurements as a function of temperature showed a sharp transition with a hysteresis width similar to 5 degrees C, and large resistance change (similar to 1.5 x 10(4)) from the semiconductor phase to the metal phase. It is interesting to note that in spite of large angle twin boundaries in these VO2 films, the SMT characteristics are better than those observed for polycrystalline films. The higher width of thermal hysteresis for the VO2 film on c-sapphire compared to a bulk single VO2 crystal and a single-crystal VO2 film on r-sapphire can be attributed to the existence of these large-angle twin grain boundaries. These findings can provide insight into the phase transformation characteristics of VO2, which has important applications in switching and memory devices.