Epitaxial realization of magnetically frustrated TbInO₃ thin films by oxide molecular beam epitaxy

Magnetically frustrated materials offer a playground for realizing exotic magnetic ground states such as quantum spin ices and spin liquids. Synthesizing such quantum magnets in thin-film form allows further tuning of the magnetic ground state with dimensionality and epitaxial strain as well as the possibility to integrate these states with other functional materials. That said, thin film quantum spin liquid materials remain scarce. We use reactive oxide molecular beam epitaxy to synthesize thin films of hexagonal TbInO₃, a magnetically frustrated rare-earth system that was recently proposed as a quantum spin liquid candidate. Due to a lattice distortion accompanied by an improper ferroelectric polarization at high temperatures, the Tb³⁺ sublattice exhibits a stuffed honeycomb geometry suggested to influence its magnetic ground state. Here, we investigate this ferroelectric distortion in TbInO₃ thin films using in-situ RHEED and post-deposition HAADF-STEM and use SQUID magnetometry to investigate the low-temperature magnetic behavior.