Publication Date:
2016-11-11
Description:
This paper reports a simple and robust route to stabilize metastable ɛ-Fe 2 O 3 as an epitaxial thin film using a GaFeO 3 (GFO) buffer in pulsed laser deposition. The use of an isostructural GFO buffer widens the range of film growth, allowing for stabilization on a range of substrates even with different surface symmetries, such as Al 2 O 3 (0001), SrTiO 3 (111), and Y:ZrO 2 (100). All films grown on these substrates were c -axis oriented with the characteristic in-plane domain structures. Magnetization of these buffered thin films showed considerable magnetic anisotropy at 350 K. In particular, in-plane magnetization was found to be relatively larger in the films grown on the Y:ZrO 2 (100) compared to the other cases. Heterostructuring ɛ-Fe 2 O 3 on GFO is promising in the applications of ε-Fe 2 O 3 for magnetic and multiferroic devices in that it provides a larger growth window and an effective means to optimize the film properties beyond the simple substitution of Fe with Ga.
Print ISSN:
0021-8979
Electronic ISSN:
1089-7550
Topics:
Physics
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