Fabrication and characterization of epitaxial Ba0.6Sr0.4TiO3/LaNiO3 heterostructures

Epitaxial Ba0.6Sr0.4TiO3 (BST)/LaNiO3 (LNO) heterostructures were fabricated on LAO (100) substrates using pulsed laser deposition (PLD). Their structural properties were investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD). The θ–2θ scans showed single crystalline BST and LNO layers with a (100) orientations perpendicular to the substrate plane. Phi scans (ϕ) on the (220) plane of BST layer indicated that the films have two in-plane orientations with respect to the substrate. The atomic force microscope (AFM) surface morphologies showed a smooth and crack-free surface with the average grain size of 55 nm and the root-mean-square (RMS) of 4.53 nm for BST films. Capacitance–voltage curves are measured. From the capacitance, a dielectric constant of 762, tunabilty of 82.81% and loss tangent of 0.032 are obtained. The current–voltage curve shows that the leakage current is 2.41 × 10⁻⁷ A/cm² under an applied voltage of 2 V.