Ferroelectricity in dopant-free HfO_(2) thin films prepared by pulsed laser deposition

As a high-k material,hafnium oxide(HfO_(2))has been used in gate dielectrics for decades.Since the discovery of polar phase in Si-doped HfO_(2) films,chemical doping has been widely demonstrated as an effective approach to stabilize the ferroelectric phase in HfO_(2) based thin films.However,the extra capping layer deposition,post-growth annealing and wake-up effect are usually required to arouse the ferroelectricity in HfO_(2) based thin films,resulting in the increase of complexity for sample synthesis and the impediment of device application.In this study,the ferroelectricity is observed in non-capped dopant-free HfO_(2) thin films prepared by pulsed laser deposition(PLD)without post-growth annealing.By adjusting the deposited temperature,oxygen pressure and thickness,the maximum polarization up to 14.7 m C/cm^(2) was obtained in 7.4 nm-thick film.The fraction of orthorhombic phase,concentrations of defects and size effects are considered as possible mechanisms for the influences of ferroelectric prop-erties.This study indicates that PLD is an effective technique to fabricate high-quality ferroelectric HfO_(2) thin films in the absence of chemical doping,capping layer deposition and post-growth annealing,which may boost the process of nonvolatile memory device application.