Fabrication and characterization of tetragonal yttria‐stabilized zirconia single‐crystalline thin film

Abstract Tetragonal yttria‐stabilized zirconia thin film was successfully fabricated by a pulsed laser deposition method. The thin film grew heteroepitaxially with the orientation relationship of ZrO 2 ‖ Al 2 O 3 . Energy dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy mapping revealed that Y 3+ ions were distributed homogeneously without local segregations. X‐ray and electron‐diffraction analysis confirmed a single crystalline structural feature of the film. On the other hand, high‐resolution scanning transmission electron microscopy observations show that this film contains small‐angle tilt grain boundaries, which is composed of the periodic array of dislocations with the Burgers vector .