Formation of titanium monoxide (001) single-crystalline thin film induced by ion bombardment of titanium dioxide (110)

Abstract

A plethora of technological applications justify why titanium dioxide is probably the most studied oxide, and an optimal exploitation of its properties quite frequently requires a controlled modification of the surface. Low-energy ion bombardment is one of the most extended techniques for this purpose and has been recently used in titanium oxides, among other applications, to favour resistive switching mechanisms or to form transparent conductive layers. Surfaces modified in this way are frequently described as reduced and defective, with a high density of oxygen vacancies. Here we show, at variance with this view, that high ion doses on rutile titanium dioxide (110) induce its transformation into a nanometric and single-crystalline titanium monoxide (001) thin film with rocksalt structure. The discovery of this ability may pave the way to new technical applications of ion bombardment not previously reported, which can be used to fabricate heterostructures and interfaces.

Enhanced superconductivity in TiO epitaxial thin films

“…Through the quantitative analysis of EELS results, 28 it was found that, as shown in Fig. S2, the oxygen content in the film is not uniform and the averaged O/Ti ratio is about 1.11-1.25, which is similar to that reported by Pabon et al 20 Although the combination of STEM images with electron diffraction pattern is a powerful tool in determining the crystal structure of materials, the results provide only local structural information of a small volume. Therefore, we carried out detailed XRD experiments.…”

“…One of the reasons for the difference in lattice parameters between the TiO film and the bulk may be related to the oxygen content, because it was reported that the lattice parameter could be reduced with increasing oxygen content. 7,19,20 As shown in the inset of The existence of the superconducting phase in the TiO film was unambiguously confirmed by its Meissner effect and zero resistance. Figure 2a shows the direct-current (DC) magnetizations vs. temperature (M-T) of the TiO film.…”

“…There was only one~10 nm TiO single crystalline film reported very recently, which was formed on titanium dioxide (TiO 2 ) substrate through the surface chemical reduction method by a low-energy ion bombardment technique. 20 Although this method is good at creating a thin TiO film on TiO 2 substrate, no magnetic and electrical properties concerning the superconductivity were reported. In fact, it is still a challenge to prepare high-quality TiO epitaxial films on different substrates through a more controllable method like magnetron sputtering or pulsed laser deposition techniques.…”

Towards spin-polarized two-dimensional electron gas at a surface of an antiferromagnetic insulating oxide

“…Oxide surfaces are prone to the formation of oxygen vacancies [64][65][66] and as discussed above, we also observe the presence of oxygen vacancies at the surface of the superlattice film from O K edge EELS.…”

Nano Titanium Monoxide Crystals and Unusual Superconductivity at 11 K

“…Rapid quenching from high temperature is especially required to avoid the γ–α phase transformation . Nanocrystalline TiO has been successfully prepared by nonconventional methods, such as laser pyrolysis, laser ablation, low‐energy ion bombardment technique, and mechanochemical synthesis by using high‐energy ball milling and subsequent annealing . Unfortunately, these fabrication routes have encountered with contamination problem and harsh synthesis conditions induced difficulty in nanostructure construction.…”