Evaluation of nanostructured BiZn0.5Ti0.5O3 thin films deposited by RF magnetron sputtering

Highlights: • We successfully deposited thin films of BiZn_0.5Ti_0.5O₃ on the substrate Pt(1 1 1)/Ti/SiO₂/Si by RF magnetron sputtering. • Films had polycrystalline nature, with lattice parameters a = 3750 Å and c = 4664 Å. • The microstructure revealed that for the two highest sintering temperatures, the difference in grain size was considerable. • The microtexture of the deposited films exhibited a highly homogeneous behavior. In this paper, we have successfully deposited BiZn_0.5Ti_0.5O₃ thin films by RF Magnetron sputtering. The crystalline structure, microstructure, and microtexture were carefully studied. The results reveal that the films had polycrystalline nature, with lattice parameters a = 3750 Å and c = 4664 Å. Films sintered above 600 °C in a normal air atmosphere crystallize in a P4mm tetragonal structure. In the films sintered at 700 °C, it was concluded that the residual structure was due to a second phase. The films exhibited a microstructure consistent with other recently reported works. While the spatial analysis unveils temperature-driven variations in the surface roughness and fractal dimension, the high level of topographic uniformity remained statistically robust. Our work has provided results that can help to design new piezoelectric materials based on the control of structure and morphology as a function of sintering temperature.