Electrical and Optical Properties of Amorphous SnO2:Ta Films, Prepared by DC and RF Magnetron Sputtering: A Systematic Study of the Influence of the Type of the Reactive Gas

By reactive magnetron sputtering from a ceramic SnO2:Ta target onto unheated substrates, X-ray amorphous SnO:Ta films were prepared in gas mixtures of Ar/O2(N2O, H2O). The process windows, where the films exhibit the lowest resistivity values, were investigated as a function of the partial pressure of the reactive gases O2, N2O and H2O. We found that all three gases lead to the same minimum resistivity, while the width of the process window is broadest for the reactive gas H2O. While the amorphous films were remarkably conductive (ρ ≈ 5 × 10−3 Ωcm), the films crystallized by annealing at 500 °C exhibit higher resistivities due to grain boundary limited conduction. For larger film thicknesses (d ≳ 150 nm), crystallization occurs already during the deposition, caused by the substrate temperature increase due to the energy influx from the condensing film species and from the plasma (ions, electrons), leading to higher resistivities of these films. The best amorphous SnO2:Ta films had a resistivity of lower than 4 × 10−3 Ωcm, with a carrier concentration of 1.1 × 1020 cm−3, and a Hall mobility of 16 cm2/Vs. The sheet resistance was about 400 Ω/□ for 100 nm films and 80 Ω/□ for 500 nm thick films. The average optical transmittance from 500 to 1000 nm is greater than 76% for 100 nm films, where the films, deposited with H2O as reactive gas, exhibit even a slightly higher transmittance of 80%. These X-ray amorpous SnO2:Ta films can be used as low-temperature prepared transparent and conductive protection layers, for instance, to protect semiconducting photoelectrodes for water splitting, and also, where appropriate, in combination with more conductive TCO films (ITO or ZnO).

The Effect of Substrate Temperature on the Band Transition, Cauchy Dispersion and Urbach Energy of Nanostructure CdO Thin Films

Thin films of CdO were prepared by chemical spray pyrolysis (CSP) . The effect of different temperature substrate (300,350,400,450 and 500) °C on some optical parameters has been studied . The transmittance and the optical energy gap were increased from (2.503-2.589) eV ,on the contrary of the rest parameters such as refractive index , real and imaginary parts of dielectric constant and Urbach energy which they were decreased as the substrate temperature increase.

GaZnO as a Transparent Electrode to Silicon Carbide

The characteristics of Ga-doped zinc oxide (GaZnO) thin films deposited at different substrate temperatures (TS~250 to 550oC) on 4H-SiC have been investigated. Structural and electrical properties of GaZnO thin film on n-type 4H-SiC (100)were investigated by using x-ray diffraction, atomic force microscopy (AFM), Hall effect measurement, and Auger electron spectroscopy (AES). Hall mobility is found to increase as the substrate temperature increase from 250 to 550 oC, whereas the lowest resistivity (~3.3 x 10-4 Ωcm) and highest carrier concentration (~1.33x1021cm-3) values are observed for the GaZnO films deposited at 400 oC. It has been found that the c-axis oriented crystalline quality as well as the relative amount of activated Ga3+ Introduction ions may affect the electrical properties of GaZnO films on SiC.

Growth and Characterization of Silicon Carbide by Sublimation

Bulk silicon carbide (SiC) single crystal was fabricated by attaching abrasive SiC powder directly to graphite electrode. The substrate temperature was important to SiC crystal growth. When the temperature of substrate varied from 2300K to 2600K, with substrate temperature increase, the size of finally obtained SiC single crystal increased. At 2600K, the maximum size of SiC crystal, 2cm in diameter, was obtained. The effect of temperature to SiC single crystal growth rate and the growth kinetics were discussed. The phase composition and surface morphology was studied by XRD and SEM respectively.