Rapid Pyrolysis of SmBa2Cu3O7-δ Films in CSD-MOD Using Extremely-Low-Fluorine Solutions

Abstract

SmBa2Cu3O7-δ (SmBCO) films have been prepared by chemical solution deposition starting from extremely-low-fluorine solutions (7% fluorine with respect to standard full trifluoroacetate solutions). Smooth and homogeneous SmBCO films could be achieved at heating rates of up to 20 °C/min during pyrolysis. The best films were achieved at a crystallization temperature of 810 °C and 50 ppm of oxygen partial pressure. At these conditions, the ~270 nm thick SmBCO films grow mostly c-axis-oriented with J c sf values at 77 K of ~2 MA/cm2 and critical temperatures Tc of up to 95.0 K. These results demonstrate that using extremely-low-fluorine solutions is very attractive since the production rate can be largely increased due to the solutions’ robustness during pyrolysis retaining a remarkable quality of the grown films. Nevertheless, further optimization of the growth process is needed to improve the superconducting properties of the films.