Growth and Characterization of La2Zr2O7 Buffer Layers Deposited by Chemical Solution Deposition (Superconductivity Centennial Conference)

The deposition and characterization of La2Zr2O7 thin films deposited by metal-organic decomposition method on both single crystal SrTiO3 and cube textured Ni-5 at.% W substrates are presented. Metal acetylacetonates in propionic acid solution was used. The results showed that LZO films are epitaxially grown with smooth surface with rms roughness around 2 nm. YBa2Cu3O7-delta films, deposited by pulsed laser deposition technique on LZO buffer layers, showed critical temperature of 90 K and critical current density in self magnetic field J(c) = 1.6 and 13 MA/cm(2) at 77 K and 4.2 K, respectively. A better J(c) retention in magnetic field for YBCO films deposited on LZO/STO than YBCO on bare STO is observed indicating a rather strong vortex pinning as confirmed by microwave measurements. (C) 1012 Published by Elsevier B.V. Selection and/or peer-review under responsibility of the Guest Editors