Growth and high frequency characterization of Mn doped sol-gel Pb xSr1-xTiO3 for frequency agile applications

In pursuit of thin film ferroelectric materials for frequency agile applications that are both easily adapted to large area deposition and also high performance, an investigation has been carried out into sol-gel deposition of 3% Mn doped (Pb0.4Sr0.6)TiO3. Large area capability has been demonstrated by growth of films with good crystallinity and grain structure on 4 in. Si wafers. Metal-insulator-metal capacitors have also been fabricated and development of an improved de-embedding technique that takes parasitic impedances fully into account has enabled accurate extraction of the high frequency dielectric properties of the PbxSr1−xTiO3 films. Practically useful values of ε ∼ 1000, tan δ ∼ 0.03, and tunability ∼ 50% have been obtained in the low gigahertz range (1–5 GHz). Peaks in the dielectric loss due to acoustic resonance have been modeled and tentatively identified as due to an electrostrictive effect with an electromechanical coupling coefficient of ∼ 0.04 at an electric field of 240 kV/cm which is potentially useful for tunable thin film bulk acoustic wave devices.