Epitaxial gadolinium nitride thin films

GdN thin films are deposited on MgO(100) by low-energy ion-beam-assisted molecular-beam epitaxy at elevated temperatures. Elemental analysis by secondary-ion mass spectrometry proves that a protective layer is imperative to avoid oxidation of the GdN films in air. In situ surface structural investigation of the growing GdN films by reflection high-energy electron diffraction reveals epitaxial film growth. This result is confirmed by x-ray diffraction structure and texture analysis. Accordingly, the GdN films on MgO(100) exhibit cube-on-cube epitaxy. Due to the epitaxial growth the crystalline quality of the films is by far higher than that of films previously reported of in literature. (c) 2007 American Institute of Physics.