Ferroelectricity and superconductivity in strained EuxSr1-xTiO3 films

The superconducting transition of SrTiO3 can be influenced by tuning its ferroelectric transition, but the underlying reasons remain poorly understood. Here, we investigate compressively strained, Sm-doped films of EuxSr1-xTiO3 that were grown by molecular beam epitaxy to determine the effect of alloying with Eu on both superconductivity and ferroelectricity, both of which are present in strained SrTiO3 films. Remarkably, superconductivity survives up to x = 0.14. Films at the lowest alloy concentration studied here, x = 0.09, exhibit no suppression of their superconducting transition temperature, but there is a strong reduction of the upper critical field (Hc2), compared to nonalloyed, strained SrTiO3 films. In addition, these films lack the sharp ferroelectric transition that appears in films without Eu in second harmonic generation measurements. We postulate that Eu alloying causes a crossover from a globally ordered ferroelectric state to one with only short-range polar order. We discuss the connection between the loss of global polar order and the change in the superconducting properties.

Automated summary

We investigated the effect of alloying with Eu on the superconductivity and ferroelectricity of compressively strained Sm-doped films of EuxSr1-xTiO3. We found that superconductivity can still survive when the alloying concentration of Eu is x=0.14. However, at x=0.09, there is no suppression of the superconducting transition temperature but a significant reduction in the upper critical field (Hc2). In addition, these films lack the sharp ferroelectric transition observed in films without Eu. We propose that Eu alloying leads to a crossover from a globally ordered ferroelectric state to one with only short-range polar order.