Structural effects on the electronic properties of epitaxially strained RNiO$_{3}$ thin films

Since the metal--insulator (MI) transition is a hallmark of strongly correlated materials, understanding the behavior of the MI transition of RNiO$_{3}$ (R=rare earth) thin films subjected to confinement, lattice misfit and broken symmetry at the interface in the ultra-thin limit is fundamentally and technologically important [1]. Here we present a study of the effect of the lattice symmetry with epitaxial strain in thin films of LaNiO$_{3}$ and NdNiO$_{3}$ grown on SrTiO$_{3}$(001) substrates by pulsed laser deposition. A combination of x-ray diffraction, soft x-ray absorption spectroscopy, and temperature-dependent resistivity has been applied to elucidate structural and electronic properties of the samples. Work at the Advanced Photon Source, Argonne is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357.\\[4pt] [1] Jian. Liu et al., Appl. Phys. Lett. 96, 233110 (2010).