Compressive strain-induced metal-insulator transition in orthorhombic   SrIrO3 thin films
  We have investigated the electronic properties of epitaxial orthorhombic SrIrO3 thin-films under compressive strain. The metastable, orthorhombic SrIrO3 thin-films are synthesized on various substrates using an epi-stabilization technique. We have observed that as in-plane lattice compression is increased, the dc-resistivity (\r{ho}) of the thin films increases by a few orders of magnitude, and the d\r{ho}/dT changes from positive to negative values. However, optical absorption spectra show Drude-like, metallic responses without an optical gap opening for all compressively-strained thin films. Transport measurements under magnetic fields show negative magneto-resistance at low temperature for compressively-strained thin-films. Our results suggest that weak localization is responsible for the strain-induced metal-insulator transition for the orthorhombic SrIrO3 thin-films. 
J. H. Gruenewald, J. Nichols, J. Terzic, G. Cao, J. W. Brill, and S.   S. A. Seo
cond-mat.str-el cond-mat.mtrl-sci