Preferential growth mechanism of REBa2Cu3Oy (RE = Y, Nd) crystal on MgO substrate by liquid phase epitaxy

• Published in: Journal of materials research Vol. 16; no. 4; pp. 979 - 989
• Main Authors: Nomura, Katsumi, Hoshi, Saburo, Yao, Xin, Kakimoto, Kazuomi, Nakamura, Yuichi, Izumi, Teruo, Shiohara, Yuh
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York, USA Cambridge University Press 01.04.2001
• ISSN: 0884-2914; 2044-5326
• DOI: 10.1557/JMR.2001.0138

Growth of the REBa2Cu3Oy (REBCO, RE = Y, Nd) crystals on the MgO substrates by the liquid phase epitaxy (LPE) process was investigated to clarify the growth mechanism. The crystal orientation of in-plane alignment was improved during the LPE process due to the preferential dissolution and growth even from a polycrystalline seed film. The orientation of preferential growth depended on the kind of RE for the REBCO system. The phenomena could be explained by the coarsening model by introducing the difference in the interfacial energies, which were considered not only general lattice matching but the Coulomb force at the interface between the REBCO and the MgO crystals. The preferential growth model was developed, and the calculation results showed a good agreement with the experimental results.