Epitaxial growth and the magnetic properties of orthorhombic YTiO ₃ thin films

High-quality YTi O3 thin films were grown on LaAl O3 (110) substrates at low oxygen pressures (≤ 10-8 Torr) using pulsed laser deposition. The in-plane asymmetric atomic arrangements at the substrate surface allowed the authors to grow epitaxial YTi O3 thin films, which have an orthorhombic crystal structure with quite different a - and b -axis lattice constants. The YTi O3 film exhibited a clear ferromagnetic transition at 30 K with a saturation magnetization of about 0.7 μB Ti. The magnetic easy axis was found to be along the [1-10] direction of the substrate, which differs from the single crystal easy axis direction, i.e., [001].