High transparent conductor figure-of-merit in SrVO₃grown by solid-phase epitaxy

SrVO₃ thin films with a high optical transparency and electrical conductivity were formed by crystallizing amorphous layers using solid-phase epitaxy (SPE). Epitaxial complex oxides incorporating transition metal ions can be formed by SPE with thermodynamics and kinetics derived from crystallization processes that are initiated at buried amorphous/crystalline interfaces. Thermodynamic calculations predict the temperature and oxygen partial pressure conditions required to produce the SrVO₃ phase and match the experimental conditions. The lattice parameters and mosaic angular width of x-ray reflections from the crystallized films show that the 16 nm layers are coherently strained.  The strain resulting from the epitaxial mismatch between SrVO₃ and SrTiO₃ is relaxed in the 60 nm layer. SrVO₃ layers with 16 nm thickness exhibited a room temperature resistivity of 5.2 × 10^-5 Ω cm and visible light transmission of 0.89. Increasing the film thickness resulted in lower room temperature resistivity and a significant reduction in optical transparency. Temperature-dependent resistivity measurements between 5 K and 300 K reveal residual resistivity ratios of 2 and 3.8 for 16 and 60 nm SrVO₃ layers, respectively. The temperature dependence of the resistivity for SPE-grown SrVO₃ will be discussed, including the effect of electron scattering from structural defects at low temperatures.