Superconducting properties of Nd-Ba-Cu-O thick films prepared by liquid phase epitaxial growth

C-axis oriented Nd/sub 1+x/Ba/sub 2-x/Cu/sub 3/O/sub y/ thick films were grown by the liquid phase epitaxy (LPE) technique onto MgO (100) single crystal substrates in Ar gas atmosphere containing 0.5 at.% O/sub 2/. The superconducting transition temperature T/sub c/ was very broad, when the film thickness was 10 /spl mu/m but became very sharp when it was increased to 100 /spl mu/m. The T/sub c/ value for the 100 /spl mu/m thick film could be increased up to 92 K by post-annealing at 300/spl deg/C for 336 hrs in O/sub 2/ atmosphere. Moreover, the peak effect, which is characterized by an increase in magnetisation with increasing magnetic field up to 15000 G at 50 K, was observed in the 100 /spl mu/m thick film. A substantial improvement in the superconducting properties when the film thickness is increased to 100 /spl mu/m, can be attributed to the stable persistence of the steady state growth mode instead of the transient mode responsible for the first 10 /spl mu/m thick deposition.