CeO2 single buffer layer for YBCO RABiTS coated conductors

Abstract

Chemical solution deposition techniques are promising approaches to achieve epitaxial oxide thin films at a low cost and easy scaling for YBa2Cu3O7 coated conductors. High quality CeO2 buffer layers were prepared by CSD on Ni RABiTS. The precursor used for the preparation of fluorite CeO2 films was Ce(III) acetate dissolved in propionic acid. YBCO layers were deposited by pulsed laser deposition (PLD) on CeO2 buffers, leading to a simple low cost architecture NiRABiTS/CeO2 CSD/YBCOPLD. YBCO film epitaxially grown on 181-nm- thick CeO2 buffer exhibited a critical temperature Tc = 90.5 K. Some aspects regarding the correlation between the surface morphology of CeO2 film, the microstructure, and the transport parameters of YBCO film deposited on this buffer are discussed.