Epitaxial growth and characterisation of artificial and superconducting superlattices deposited by PLD

Thin films and artificial materials deposition, applied to the study of high temperature superconductors, can be a powerful method to achieve better comprehension of the conduction mechanisms in these materials and, in perspective, to obtain new superconducting compounds. We simulate the layered structure of the superconducting oxides by alternating infinite layer compounds (CaCuO2, SrCuO2, BaCuO2) both pure and doped either with chemical substitutions or stoichiometry variations. By the first way, we obtained superlattices with a semiconducting electrical behaviour, probably because of the disorder induced by such high chemical substitutions. The second way led to superconducting films with transition temperatures around 80 K and low anisotropy. Furthermore, their artificial nature offers an unique possibility of analysing the influence of the structural properties on the superconducting behaviour, such as the correlation between the number of CuO2 planes contained in the infinite layer block (CaCuO2) and the transport properties.