Buckle delamination of textured TiO2 thin films on mica

We present the growth of textured TiO2 thin films on muscovite mica using pulsed laser deposition. Atomic force microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, X-ray photoemission spectroscopy, and transmission electron microscopy were used to characterize the TiO2 films. Quasi-periodic wavy and comb-like buckles were observed. Below a critical thickness of about 25 nm, TiO2 films were relatively smooth, and buckles began to form when the nominal thickness of TiO2 films was larger than 25 nm. Co-existence of wavy and comb-like quasi-periodic buckles was observed when the nominal thickness of TiO2 films was larger than 100 nm. The film stress is compressive due to the competition of the tensile stress from the lattice mismatch and the growth stress. The buckle delamination occurred when the compressive stress overcome the adhesion strength of the TiO2 films on mica. A value of adhesion strength around 0.9 MPa for TiO2 on mica is obtained. The symmetric domains of buckles are assigned to the anisotropic lattice mismatch for TiO2 on mica