Effect of stress in copper ferrite thin films

Cubic copper ferrite thin films, obtained by rf sputtering on quartz and subsequent post-annealing and quenching, show a large coercivity of about 300-600 Oe. Stress measurements using X-ray diffraction show high value of stress of about 400-1000 MPa. Both the stress and coercivity are found to increase with the decrease of the thickness of the films. There appears to be a contribution of the stress to the coercivity of the films, in the in-plane M-H loops. (c) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.