Deposition of PZT thin films by hybrid process comprising sol-gel method and laser ablation for microscanners

Lead zirconate titanate (Pb(Zr0.52Ti0.48)O3: PZT) thin films were prepared on Pt/Ti/SiO₂/Si substrates by hybrid processing: sol-gel method and laser ablation. The preferred orientation of the PZT films obtained by the hybrid process can be controlled using the seed layer obtained by the sol-gel method. The remnant polarization and the coercive field of this film were 28.6 μC/cm² and 58.0 kV/cm, while the dielectric constant and loss values measured at 1 kHz were approximately 1050 and 0.045, respectively. The devices of micro mirrors were successfully fabricated through the PZT film deposition, lithography cyclotron resonance (ECR), reactive ion etching (RIE) and inductively coupled plasma (ICP) releasing processes. The scanning angle was about 6±2 degrees by resonating two beams with AC 5 Vp-p at the resonance frequency of 1975 Hz. The results indicated that the piezoelectric PZT films deposited by the hybrid process have sufficient actuation capability for MEMS application.