Characterization of epitaxial titanium nitride mediated single-crystal nickel oxide grown on MgO-(100) and Si-(100)
Type
ArticleAuthors
Liang, Jian Wei
Li, Kuang-Hui

Kang, Chun Hong

Braic, Laurentiu

Kiss, Adrian Emil

Zoita, Nicolae Catalin

Ng, Tien Khee

Ooi, Boon S.

KAUST Department
Computer, Electrical and Mathematical Sciences and Engineering (CEMSE) DivisionElectrical Engineering Program
Material Science and Engineering
Material Science and Engineering Program
Photonics Laboratory
Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division
Thin Films & Characterization
KAUST Grant Number
BAS/1/1614-01-01Date
2020-06-12Online Publication Date
2020-06-12Print Publication Date
2020-06-01Submitted Date
2020-04-30Permanent link to this record
http://hdl.handle.net/10754/663523
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
Single-crystal nickel oxide (NiO) was grown, using epitaxial titanium nitride (TiN) as a preorienting interlayer, on both the lattice-matching substrate of magnesium oxide in the (100) surface orientation, MgO-(100), and a lattice-mismatched silicon (100) substrate, Si-(100), by high-temperature pulsed-laser deposition. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first report of its kind in the literature. The high-temperature sputter-deposited TiN interlayer is crucial for forming a bottom contact for the implementation of a device, and as a lattice-matching layer for NiO and MgO. The structural, surface-related, and elemental properties of the as-grown NiO/TiN/MgO(100) and NiO/TiN/Si(100) samples were determined by high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM), x-ray diffraction (XRD), thinfilm x-ray diffraction, atomic force microscopy, and scanning transmission electron microscopy in conjunction with energy-dispersed x-ray spectroscopy. XRD rocking curve data confirmed that the NiO layers were single crystalline on both template substrates, and the structural quality of NiO/TiN on the lattice-matching MgO substrate surpassed that on the Si substrate. XRD φ-scan data confirmed the cube-on-cube stacking of NiO and TiN. An analysis of HRTEM fast Fourier transform (FFT) images further confirmed the single crystallinity of the NiO and TiN layers, while lattice mismatches at the NiO/TiN, TiN/MgO, and TiN/Si interfaces were examined using the FFT line profile measurements of HRTEM. The resulting thin film of single-crystalline NiO can be used as a transparent conducting electrode in group-III oxide and group-III nitride semiconductor devices, and in such electrochemical processes as solar hydrogen generation and nitrogen reduction reactions.Citation
Liang, J.-W., Li, K.-H., Kang, C. H., Braic, L., Kiss, A. E., Zoita, N. C., … Ooi, B. S. (2020). Characterization of epitaxial titanium nitride mediated single-crystal nickel oxide grown on MgO-(100) and Si-(100). AIP Advances, 10(6), 065318. doi:10.1063/5.0012362Sponsors
This research was supported by the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) baseline funding, Grant No. BAS/1/1614-01-01, and by the Romanian Ministry of Education and Scientific Research through the National Core Program, Grant No. 18N/08.02.2019. The authors further acknowledge the access of the Nanofabrication Core Lab as well as the Imaging and Characterization Core Lab facilities at KAUST.Publisher
AIP PublishingJournal
AIP AdvancesAdditional Links
http://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/5.0012362https://aip.scitation.org/doi/pdf/10.1063/5.0012362
ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1063/5.0012362
Scopus Count
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