Epitaxial Pb(Zr,Ti)O3 thin films for a MEMS application

Minh D Nguyen, Hung N Vu, Dave H A Blank and Guus Rijnders

Abstract

This research presents the deposition and device fabrication of epitaxial Pb(Zr,Ti)O₃ (PZT) thin films for applications in microelectromechanical systems (MEMS). A piezoelectric micro-membrane is described as an example. Using the pulsed laser deposition (PLD) technique and the MEMS microfabrication process, the piezo-membranes with diameters ranging from 200 to 500 μm were obtained. The displacement of piezo-membranes increased from 5.1 to 17.5 nm V⁻¹ with a piezoelectric-membrane diameter in the range of 200–500 μm. Furthermore, the effect of PZT film-thickness on the mechanical properties has been investigated. By using the conductive-oxide SrRuO₃ (SRO) layers as the electrodes, the degradation of both ferroelectric and piezoelectric properties is prevented up to 10¹⁰switching cycles