<i>In Situ</i> studies of LaNiO3 growth by oxide molecular beam epitaxy

ORAL

Abstract

LaNiO3 films have triggered enormous interest owing to its paramagnetic and metallic behavior [1] as well as the recent discovery of superconductivity in RNiO3-based heterostructures. The quality of the deposited film is known to depend strongly on the structure and composition of the single crystal substrate surface. Here, exploiting in situ synchrotron X-ray investigation during thin film growth by molecular beam epitaxy, we study and understand the growth behavior of LaNiO3 films on (LaAlO3)(Sr2AlTaO6) (001) substrates with different surface compositions, in combination with resonant anomalous diffraction measurements [2]. We find that the fabrication of atomically smooth, high quality and phase pure epitaxial LaNiO3 films can be achieved on LSAT substrates, irrespective of initial substrate surface composition and layer-by-layer deposition sequence, illustrating that dynamic rearrangement of layers occurs during the growth of complex oxides on top of mixed-terminated substrates. This has important implications regarding the use of a wider variety of substrates for fundamental studies on complex oxide systems.

*Work supported by the Department of Energy, Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences under contract no. DE-AC02-06CH11357.

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Presenters

  • YAN LI

    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Lab

Authors

  • YAN LI

    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Lab

  • Friederike Wrobel

    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, IL, 60439, USA
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Lab

  • Xi Yan

    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, IL, 60439, USA
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Lab

  • Anand Bhattacharya

    • Argonne National Laboratory
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Lab

  • Jirong Sun

    • Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter & Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, People’s Republic of China
    • Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter & Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
    • Institute of Physics

  • Huanhua Wang

    • Institute of High Energy Physics

  • Hawoong Hong

    • Argonne National Laboratory
    • Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, IL, 60439, USA
    • Advanced Photon Source

  • Hua Zhou

    • X-ray Science Division, Advanced Photon Source,, Argonne National Laboratory
    • Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory
    • Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, IL, 60439, USA
    • Argonne National Laboratory
    • Advanced Photon Source, Argonne National Lab
    • Advanced Photon Source

  • Dillon D Fong

    • Argonne National Laboratory
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Lemont, IL, 60439, USA
    • Materials Science Division, Argonne National Lab