Thin film lithium niobate on silicon

Thin films of LiNbO3 have been grown on silicon substrates by reactive RF sputtering. Films grown on (111) silicon heated to 550°C have been shown by x-ray diffraction techniques to be oriented with the c axis normal to the silicon surface. A lift-off process has been used in an attempt to isolate regions of LiNbO3 to form metal-ferroelectric-insulator-semiconductor (MFS) structures. Conventional metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) techniques were used to characterize the resulting devices. Many of the bulk ferroelectric properties were observed in these devices such as photocurrents due to the bulk photovoltaic effect and the pyroelectric effect. A preliminary investigation has also shown the polarization of these MFS structures to be reversible with an applied electric field at room temperature.