# Integration of Imprint-Free and Low Coercivity Ferroelectric BaTiO3 Thin Films on Silicon

## TL;DR

Researchers developed high-quality ferroelectric BaTiO3 thin films on silicon, enabling efficient memory and logic devices.

## Contribution

A SrSn1–xTi_xO3 pseudosubstrate enables imprint-free and low-coercivity BaTiO3 films on silicon with stable polarization.

## Key findings

- BaTiO3 thin films on Si show imprint-free switching and low coercivity.
- The SrSn1–xTi_xO3 layer stabilizes out-of-plane polarization and prevents fatigue over 10^10 cycles.
- This approach improves interfacial quality and ferroelectric performance on silicon.

## Abstract

Highly crystalline
ferroelectric oxides integrated on
Si hold great
promise for energy-efficient memory and logic technologies. Exploiting
epitaxial strain engineering in these materials is, however, severely
hampered on Si, where the large structural mismatch often results
in an inferior interfacial quality and causes degradation of the ferroelectric
switching characteristics. In this work, we present the growth of
single-crystalline BaTiO3 thin films on Si, exhibiting
imprint-free switching, low coercivity, high remanent polarization,
and no fatigue for over 1010 switching cycles. We accomplish
this via the insertion of a SrSn1–x
Ti
x
O3 layer on SrTiO3-buffered Si. This layer serves as a pseudosubstrate that alleviates
the thermal strain that the Si substrate imposes on the BaTiO3 layer, while simultaneously providing moderate compressive
strain that stabilizes a pure out-of-plane polarization. Thus, our
work paves the way toward the fabrication of Si-compatible, low-power-consuming
ferroelectric devices.