Growth of biaxial textured MgO-layers by ion-beam assisted pulsed laser deposition

Abstract

MgO thin films were deposited on amorphous substrates using pulsed laser deposition. Without an assisting ion beam, strong fibre textures are observed changing with temperature. Using an ion beam at 55° with respect to the substrate normal and energies of more than 400 eV, biaxially textured films are grown with the 〈200〉 direction parallel to the ion beam. Decreasing the deposition rate the texture changes towards the desired cube texture and resputtering becomes more important. Investigations of the surface topography show an increase in roughness and grain size with increasing film thickness. Preliminary ideas of texture and microstructure development in this deposition process are presented.