Sr flux stability against oxidation in oxide-molecular-beam-epitaxy environment: Flux, geometry, and pressure dependence

Maintaining stable fluxes for multiple source elements is a challenging task when the source materials have significantly different oxygen affinities in a complex-oxide molecular-beam-epitaxy (MBE) environment. Considering that Sr is one of the most easily oxidized and widely used elements in various complex oxides, we took Sr as a probe to investigate the flux-stability problem in a number of different conditions. Source oxidation was less for higher flux, extended port geometry, and unmelted source shape. The extended port geometry also eliminated the flux transient after opening a source shutter as observed in the standard port. We also found that the source oxidation occurred more easily on the crucible wall than on the surface of the source material. Atomic oxygen, in spite of its stronger oxidation effectiveness, did not make any difference in source oxidation as compared to molecular oxygen in this geometry. Our results may provide a guide for solutions to the source oxidation problem in oxide-MBE system.