Tc=21 K in epitaxial FeSe0.5Te0.5 thin films with biaxial compressive strain

Epitaxial FeSe0.5Te0.5 thin films with different thickness were grown by pulsed laser ablation deposition on different substrates. High purity phase and fully epitaxial growth were obtained. By varying the film thickness, superconducting transition temperatures up to 21 K were observed, significantly larger than the bulk value 16.2 K. Structural analyses indicated that the c-axis is smaller than the bulk value but it is almost independent of the film thickness and the a-axis changes significantly with the film thickness and is linearly related to the T-c. The latter result indicates the important role of the compressive strain in enhancing T-c. T-c is also related to both the Fe-(Se,Te) bond length and angle, suggesting the possibility of further enhancement. (C) 2010 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3358148]