Growth of HgBa₂Ca₂Cu₃O₈ thin films using stable Re_0.1Ba₂Ca₂Cu₃O_x precursor by pulsed laser deposition

High quality c-axis oriented HgBa₂Ca₂Cu₃O₈ thin films have been fabricated with the stable Re-doped Ba₂Ca₂Cu₃O_x precursor powder by pulsed laser deposition followed by postannealing without any special handling. As-grown films on (100) SrTiO₃ exhibit a zero-resistance transition (T_c,zero) at ∼131 K with a narrow transition width ΔT∼1.5K after oxygen annealing at 340°C for 12 h. The critical current densities are observed 1.1×10⁷A/cm² at 10 K and 1.2×10⁵A/cm² at 120 K in zero field. The x-ray diffraction pattern indicates highly c-axis oriented thin films normal to the substrate plane containing a minor HgBa₂CaCu₂O₆ phase. The scanning electron microscopy analysis shows that the surface morphology of the film is well connected platelike crystals but reveals Ba-Cu-O_x impurities are uniformly scattered across the film surface.