Highly aligned, spin polarized thin films of Sr2FeMoO6 by a chemical vapor process

Highly oriented films of Sr2FeMoO6 were fabricated by ultrasonic spray pyrolysis. A combined organic/inorganic solution was developed and the films were deposited on single-crystal LaAlO3 between 600 °C and 900 °C followed by postannealing at 850 °C or 1200 °C in Ar/5% H2. Optimum films showed a metallic resistivity behavior with less than a 0.25% magnetoresistive effect at 50 K, 1 T, indicative of highly quality intra- and intergranular material. At 4.2 K, the lower bound saturation magnetization, Ms was ∼2.5 μB/f.u. and the transport spin polarization was 60±3%.