Title
Growth and vacuum post-annealing effect on the structural, electrical and optical properties of Sn-doped In<inf>2</inf>O<inf>3</inf> thin films
Date Issued
01 September 2020
Access level
metadata only access
Resource Type
journal article
Publisher(s)
Elsevier B.V.
Abstract
Nowadays, the fabrication of cheaper, thermodynamically stable and durable transparent semiconducting oxide-based thin films are on high demand to enhance the properties of optoelectronic, sensing and energy harvesting devices. It is well known that Sn-doped In2O3 (ITO) thin films are difficult to grow by direct current sputtering. However, in this work cost-effective Sn-doped In2O3 films are deposited onto borosilicate glass substrates using a direct current sputtering of metallic In/Sn-target. The film thickness was controlled by the deposition time. A post-deposition annealing of the films in a vacuum atmosphere was performed in order to control the structural, optical and electrical properties. The phase formation, crystallite grain sizes (D) and lattice parameters have been assessed from the X-ray diffraction data analysis. Cross-section Scanning electron microscope image analyses were performed in order to estimate the growth rate of thin films. A band gap energy closing was observed associated with relaxation process of the unit cell suggested by the monotonic reduction of the lattice constant. Besides, a low sheet resistance (44 Ohm/square) was obtained, which is comparable to the commercially available ITO films. Furthermore, a inverse-square dependence between the sheet resistance and the grain size was determined (Rsq ∼ 1/D2). The last was used to estimate the carrier concentration of the thicker film ∼ 1020 cm−3, which is in agreement with the value obtained from the Hall measurement.
Volume
709
Language
English
OCDE Knowledge area
Química física Métodos de investigación bioquímica Biofísica
Scopus EID
2-s2.0-85087282393
Source
Thin Solid Films
ISSN of the container
00406090
Sources of information: Directorio de Producción Científica Scopus