A method for atomic layer deposition of complex oxide thin films

Advanced technologies derive many of their capabilities from the advanced materials that they are made from. Complex oxides are a class of materials which are driving technological advancement in a host of di erent directions. These highly functional materials have a great variety of useful properties, which can be chosen and even engineered.Advanced materials require advanced deposition methods. Atomic layer deposition (ALD), a variant of chemical vapor deposition (CVD), is gaining more use in industry for its ability to provide ultra-high lm thickness resolution (down to 0.1 nm), capability to conformally coat three-dimensional structures, and its high uniformity across large surface areas. Additionally, ALD processes provide a possibility to improve economic and environmental viability of the process as compared to CVD by using and wasting less toxic reactants and expelling fewer nano-particulate byproducts.ALD processes are highly mature for many binary oxides commonly used in the semiconductor industries, however processes for depositing heavy metal oxides and complex oxides - oxides containing two or more separate metallic cations | are sorely lacking in literature.The primary focus of this work is the development of a process for depositing the complex perovskite oxide lead titanate (PbTiO3), an end group of the lead zirconate titanate family (PbZrxTi1-xO3), which has valuable technical applications as well as serves as a template for applying this research into other material systems.The author gratefully acknowledges the Army Research O ce (ARO) for their support of this project under the funding provided by Grant # W911NF-08-1-0067.M.S., Materials Science and Engineering -- Drexel University, 201