Orientation control of lead zirconate titanate film by combination of sol-gel and sputtering deposition

Highly oriented lead zirconate titanate (PZT) films were fabricated on a platinized silicon substrate using a combination of sol-gel and radio frequency (RF) magnetron sputtering deposition methods. A sol-gel derived PZT layer highly oriented to the (100) plane was deposited as a seed layer, and PZT with the same composition then was deposited on the seed layer by RF-magnetron sputtering. The film deposited on the seed layer showed a strong (100) preferred orientation, while the film deposited without the seed layer showed a (111) preferred orientation. Furthermore, a thick PZT film of up to 4 mu m was able to be deposited without cracks by using the seed layer. The piezoelectric property of the (100) oriented film was much better than that of the (111) oriented film.