Sol-gel processing and pyroelectric properties of highly oriented Pb(Mg,Zn)(1/3)Nb2/3O3 thin films

Abstract

Thin films of Pb(Mg,Zn)(1/3)Nb2/3O3 (PMZN) were fabricated by spin casting the partially hydrolyzed Pb-Mg-Zn-Nb-O complex alkoxide sols on (111) Pt-coated MgO (100) planes, A strong preferential orientation of (100) perovskite was observed in the thin film derived from the sol exhibiting pseudoplastic behavior. A small-angle X-ray scattering experiment in the Pored region was performed to correlate the observed preferential orientation with the network structure of precursor in the PMZN sol, It was shown that weakly branched precursor systems led to highly oriented perovskite grains after thin-film formation, The highly (100) oriented PMZN film exhibited a larger pyroelectric coefficient (>2 mu C/(cm(2) . K)) and pyroelectric figure-of-merit (F-D > 4 x 10(-4) Pa--1/2) than the PMZN thin film having randomly oriented grains.