Thin biaxially textured MgO and TiN films prepared by ion-beam assisted pulsed laser deposition for coated conductor applications

Thin MgO and TiN films have been grown using ion-beam assisted pulsed laser deposition on amorphous substrates. The texture development was analysed using an in situ reflection high-energy electron diffraction (RHEED). Above 250 deg. C, a sharp cube textured nucleation layer was observed in both materials using an ion beam with an energy of 800 eV under an angle of 45 deg. relative to the substrate normal. The cube texture is not stable during further ion-beam assisted growth but could be preserved using homoepitaxial growth at higher temperatures. Resulting films revealed an out-of-plane orientation of about 6 deg. and in-plane orientations of less than 13 deg. . MgO and TiN showed close similarities in the texture development, i.e., the texturing was taken place within the first nanometres during nucleation. The observed texture development can be explained through a combination of overall energy minimization and anisotropic sputter rates. Highly textured YBCO layers were grown on these templates using additional buffer layers