Nonlinear optical LiNbO3 Films grown on α-SiO2 and α-Al2O3 in waveguiding form

Abstract Nonlinear optical LiNbO3 films were grown on (001) SiO2, (001) and (012) Al2O3 substrates by pulsed laser ablation (PLA) technique. The as-grown films were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), which revealed that highly (012) textured, c-oriented and a-oriented LiNbO3 films with small surface roughness and good stoichiometry were achieved on (001) SiO2, (012) and (001) Al2O3 substrates, respectively. The optical properties of the as-grown films were evaluated by the prism coupling method from which the sharp and clear m-lines of transverse-magnetic (TM) and transverse-electric (TE) multimodes were observed. The results indicated that a good waveguiding properties have been achieved in the films prepared with this method