Epitaxial Stabilization of Ultrathin Rare-Earth Nickelates

ORAL

Abstract

The nickelate family of perovskite materials has attracted great attention in recent years due to the interesting range of properties they exhibit. In this talk we report on the successful synthesis of EuNiO$_{3}$, YNiO$_{3}$, and PrNiO$_{3}$ films grown by interrupted pulse laser epitaxy on various substrates. Investigation of the phase space of nickelate thin film epitaxy revealed a linear trend between the optimized growth temperature and the Goldschmidt tolerance factor. This correlation is explained through epitaxial stabilization and the increase of the lattice energy via distortion of the ideal perovskite cell. This explanation offers the additional benefit of not being restricted only to the nickelate perovskite family, giving it possible applicability for a wide range of perovskite-structured materials.

*JC was funded by grants from majority DOD-ARO (W911NF-11-1-0200) and partially NSF (DMR-0747808). Work at the Advanced Photon Source is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science under grant No. DEAC02-06CH11357.

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Authors

  • D.J. Meyers

    • University of Arkansas

  • E.J. Moon

    • University of Arkansas

  • M. Kareev

    • University of Arkansas

  • I.C. Tung

    • Northwestern University

  • B.A. Gray

    • Physics Department, University of Arkansas
    • University of Arkansas

  • Jian Liu

    • University of Arkansas
    • Department of Physics, University of Arkansas

  • M.J. Bedzyk

    • Northwestern University

  • J.W. Freeland

    • Argonne National Laboratory
    • Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory

  • J. Chakhalian

    • Physics Department, University of Arkansas
    • University of Arkansas