Rapid thermal processing of lead zirconate titanate thin films on Pt–GaAs substrates based on a novel 1,1,1-tris(hydroxymethyl)ethane sol-gel route

Abstract

Thin films of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) having a nominal composition of Pb(Zr 0.53 Ti 0.47 )O 3 have been prepared on platinized GaAs (Pt-GaAs) substrates using a new 1,1,1-tris(hydroxymethyl)ethane (THOME) based sol-gel technique. Rapid thermal processing (RTP) techniques were used to decompose the sol-gel layer to PZT in an effort to avoid problems of Ga͞As outdiffusion into the PZT. A crystalline PZT film was produced by firing the sol-gel coatings at 600 or 650 ± C for a dwell time of 1 s using RTP. A single deposition of the precursor sol resulted in a 0.4 mm thick PZT film. X-ray diffraction measurements revealed that the films possessed a high degree of (111) preferred orientation. Measured average values of remanent polarization (P r ) and coercive field (E c ) for the film annealed at 650 ± C for 1 s were 24 mC͞cm 2 and 32 kV͞cm, respectively, together with a low frequency dielectric constant and loss tangent at 1 kHz of 950 and 0.02. These values are comparable to those obtainable on platinized silicon (Pt-Si) substrates using conventional sol-gel methods, and are an improvement on PZT thin films prepared on platinized GaAs using an earlier sol-gel route based on 1,3-propanediol. 494