Ma. Zurbuchen et al., Suppression of superconductivity by crystallographic defects in epitaxial Sr2RuO4 films, APPL PHYS L, 78(16), 2001, pp. 2351-2353
Epitaxial Sr2RuO4 thin films grown by pulsed-laser deposition from high-pur
ity (99.98%) Sr2RuO4 targets on (001) LaAlO3 were found to be not supercond
ucting down to 0.4 K. Structural disorder is believed to be responsible. A
correlation was observed between higher resistivity ratios in electrical tr
ansport measurements and narrower x-ray diffraction rocking curve widths of
the Sr2RuO4 films. High-resolution transmission electron microscopy reveal
ed that the dominant structural defects, i.e., the defects leading to the o
bserved variation in rocking curve widths in the films, are (011) planar de
fects, with a spacing comparable to the in-plane superconducting coherence
length of Sr2RuO4. These results imply that minimizing structural disorder
is the key remaining challenge to achieving superconducting Sr2RuO4 films.
(C) 2001 American Institute of Physics.