Hydrothermally fabricated epitaxial PbTiO(3) patterns patterned lithographically by etching in hydrothermal KOH solution

Abstract

We investigated the chemical etching behavior of heteroepitaxial PbTiO(3) films on Nb-doped SrTiO(3) substrate with mono-+c-domain fabricated by using hydrothermal epitaxy. The as-fabricated films were patterned lithographically into submicron-sized patterns with various lateral sizes using KOH solution and the etching mechanism is suggested. Our study reveals the feasibility of fabricating patterned nanodomains in PbTiO(3) films by scanning probe microscopy domain engineering and a chemical etching process. Further, our study shows that an analysis of the distribution and morphology of polarized ferroelectric nanodomains in PbTiO(3) is possible through a precise control over the applied bias voltage, pulse width, and time. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.