Electrical properties of sol-gel-derived Pb(Zr0.52Ti0.48)O3 thin films on a PbTiO3-coated stainless steel substrate

Lead zirconate titanate (PZT) thin films were deposited on stainless steel (SS) substrates by a sol-gel spin-on technique, and crystallized by a low-temperature annealing process. A lead titanate thin coating was deposited between the PZT film and SS substrate in order to decrease the annealing temperature. X-ray diffraction revealed that amorphous PZT thin layers crystallized into a perovskite phase on annealed at 550 °C for 0.5 h. No second phase formation, due to chemical reactions with the substrate, was observed. For films with a thickness of 1.68 μm, the dielectric constant, tan δ, remnant polarization and coercive field were determined to be 280, 0.07, 35 μC/cm2, and 99 kV/cm, respectively. The transverse piezoelectric constant d31 was measured using a wafer flexural technique.