Deposition and annealing of lead scandium tantalate thin films for high performance thermal detector arrays

Abstract This paper describes the deposition of thin film lead scandium tantalate (Pb2ScTaO6) for use in ferroelectric microbridge thermal detectors and reports on the effect of post-deposition annealing. Two methods for the sputter deposition of PST are described - one using a single target, the other a new method using two targets. Annealing of the samples is carried out in oxygen using a commercial rapid thermal processor. Materials are characterised by X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy and show that films deposited as PST pyrochlore can be transformed to perovskite by annealing. Some annealed films have shown B-site ordering. Induced pyroelectric coefficients over 1×10−3Cm−2K−1 have been measured in the annealed films.