Lead potassium niobate thin films grown by Pulsed Laser Deposition

By pulsed laser deposition, lead potassium niobate Pb2KNb5O15 was grown on (001) oriented Gd3Ga5O12 substrate using a platinum buffer layer. The PKN thin films were characterized by X-Ray diffraction and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). The dependence of their structural properties as a function of the deposition parameters was studied. It has been found that the out of plane orientation of PKN film depends on the oxygen pressure used during the growth. Indeed, PKN thin film is oriented [001] for low pressure and is oriented [530] for high pressure. For these two orientations, the crystalline quality of PKN film was determined using omega scans.