Epitaxial Growth of La$_{1/3}$Sr$_{2/3}$FeO$_3$ thin films by laser ablation

TL;DR

This study demonstrates the successful epitaxial growth of La$_{1/3}$Sr$_{2/3}$FeO$_3$ thin films on different substrates using pulsed laser deposition, analyzing their structural and transport properties and how they vary with substrate-induced strain.

Contribution

It presents a detailed synthesis and characterization of LSFO thin films on STO and LAO substrates, highlighting substrate effects on structural and electronic properties.

Findings

LSFO films on STO show a charge-ordering transition at 180K.

Films on LAO exhibit small magnetoresistance and hysteresis around 270K.

Substrate choice influences the transport behavior and magnetic properties.

Abstract

We report on the synthesis of high quality La$_{1/3}$Sr$_{2/3}$FeO$_3$ (LSFO) thin films using the pulsed laser deposition technique on both SrTiO$_3$ (STO) and LaAlO$_3$ (LAO) substrates (100)-oriented. From X-Ray diffraction (XRD) studies, we find that the films have an out-of-plane lattice parameter around 0.3865nm, almost independent of the substrate (i.e. the nature of the strains). The transport properties reveal that, while LSFO films deposited on STO exhibit an anomaly in the resistivity vs temperature at 180K (corresponding to the charge-ordered transition and associated with a transition from a paramagnetic to an antiferromagnetic state), the films grown on LAO display a very small magnetoresistance behavior and present an hysteresis around 270K under the application of a 4T magnetic field. The changes in transport properties between both substrates are discussed and compared with the corresponding single crystals.