Fabrication of pseudocubic SrRuO3 (100) epitaxial thin films on Si by pulsed laser deposition

Pseudocubic SrRuO3 (100) epitaxial thin films were successfully fabricated on Si (100) with a SrO buffer layer of 6mm thickness by pulsed laser deposition (PLD). Reflection high-energy electron diffraction (RHEED) revealed that the epitaxial growth of SrO occurred on naturally oxidized Si substrates, followed by the epitaxial growth of SrRuO3. X-ray diffraction (XRD) revealed high crystallinity with a full-width at half maximum (FWHM) of 1.9degrees in the SrRuO3 (200) rocking curve. XRD study of the in-plane orientation clarified a cube-on-cube epitaxy in which SrRuO3 [010] was rotated by 45degrees with respect to Si [010]. Deoxidization of SiO2 on Si by Sr is thought to play an important role in realizing the epitaxial growth of SrO.